Samuel Weber

Last Name

Weber

First Name

Samuel

ORCID

0000-0003-0720-5378

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Publications1 - 10 of 43

Quantifying irreversible fracture deformation in steep fractured bedrock permafrost at Matterhorn
Weber, Samuel; Beutel, Jan; Faillettaz, Jérome; et al. (2016)
PermaSense L1-GPS for kinematic monitoring
Weber, Samuel; Beutel, Jan; Buchli, Bernhard; et al. (2014)
4th European Conference on Permafrost : Book of Abstracts
Systematic Identification of External Influences in Multi-Year Micro-Seismic Recordings Using Convolutional Neural Networks
Meyer, Matthias; Weber, Samuel; Beutel, Jan; et al. (2018)
Earth Surface Dynamics Discussions
The Permafrost Young Researchers Network (PYRN) is getting older: The past, present, and future of our evolving community
Tanski, George; Bergstedt, Helena; Bevington, Alexandre; et al. (2019)
Polar Record
A lasting legacy of the International Polar Year (IPY) 2007–2008 was the promotion of the Permafrost Young Researchers Network (PYRN), initially an IPY outreach and education activity by the International Permafrost Association (IPA). With the momentum of IPY, PYRN developed into a thriving network that still connects young permafrost scientists, engineers, and researchers from other disciplines. This research note summarises (1) PYRN’s development since 2005 and the IPY’s role, (2) the first 2015 PYRN census and survey results, and (3) PYRN’s future plans to improve international and interdisciplinary exchange between young researchers. The review concludes that PYRN is an established network within the polar research community that has continually developed since 2005. PYRN’s successful activities were largely fostered by IPY. With >200 of the 1200 registered members active and engaged, PYRN is capitalising on the availability of social media tools and rising to meet environmental challenges while maintaining its role as a successful network honouring the legacy of IPY.
In situ observations of the Swiss periglacial environment using GNSS instruments
Cicoira, Alessandro; Weber, Samuel; Biri, Andreas; et al. (2022)
Earth System Science Data
Monitoring of the periglacial environment is relevant for many disciplines including glaciology, natural hazard management, geomorphology, and geodesy. Since October 2022, Rock Glacier Velocity (RGV) is a new Essential Climate Variable (ECV) product within the Global Climate Observing System (GCOS). However, geodetic surveys at high elevation remain very challenging due to environmental and logistical reasons. During the past decades, the introduction of low-cost global navigation satellite system (GNSS) technologies has allowed us to increase the accuracy and frequency of the observations. Today, permanent GNSS instruments enable continuous surface displacement observations at millimetre accuracy with a sub-daily resolution. In this paper, we describe decennial time series of GNSS observables as well as accompanying meteorological data. The observations comprise 54 positions located on different periglacial landforms (rock glaciers, landslides, and steep rock walls) at altitudes ranging from 2304 to 4003 and spread across the Swiss Alps. The primary data products consist of raw GNSS observables in RINEX format, inclinometers, and weather station data. Additionally, cleaned and aggregated time series of the primary data products are provided, including daily GNSS positions derived through two independent processing tool chains. The observations documented here extend beyond the dataset presented in the paper and are currently continued with the intention of long-term monitoring. An annual update of the dataset, available at https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.948334 (Beutel et al., 2022), is planned. With its future continuation, the dataset holds potential for advancing fundamental process understanding and for the development of applied methods in support of e.g. natural hazard management.
A decade of high-mountain permafrost data at Matterhorn Hörnligrat (Zermatt, CH)
Weber, Samuel; Beutel, Jan; Geiger, Alain; et al. (2018)
Kinematics and thermal conditions in the permafrost-affected rockwalls of the Aiguille du Midi (3842 m a.s.l., Mont Blanc massif, France)
Ravanel, Ludovic; Grangier, Germain; Weber, Samuel; et al. (2016)
Geophysical Research Abstracts
Environmental controls of frost cracking revealed through in-situ acoustic emission measurements in steep bedrock
Girard, Lucas; Gruber, Stephan; Weber, Samuel; et al. (2013)
Geophysical Research Letters
Frost cracking, the breakdown of rock by freezing, is one of the most important mechanical weathering processes acting on Earth's surface. Insights on the mechanisms driving frost cracking stem mainly from laboratory and theoretical studies. Transferring insights from such studies to natural conditions, involving jointed bedrock and heterogeneous thermal and hydrological properties, is a major challenge. We address this problem with simultaneous in situ measurements of acoustic emissions, used as proxy of rock damage, and rock temperature/moisture content. The 1 year data set acquired in an Alpine rock wall shows that (1) liquid water content has an important impact on freezing-induced rock damage, (2) sustained freezing can yield much stronger damage than repeated freeze-thaw cycling, and (3) that frost cracking occurs over the full range of temperatures measured extending from 0 down to −15°C. These new measurements yield a slightly different picture than previous field studies where ice segregation appears to play an important role.
Event-triggered Natural Hazard Monitoring with Convolutional Neural Networks on the Edge
Meyer, Matthias; Farei-Campagna, Timo; Pasztor, Akos; et al. (2018)
arXiv
Quantifying irreversible movement in steep, fractured bedrock permafrost on Matterhorn (CH)
Weber, Samuel; Beutel, Jan; Faillettaz, Jérome; et al. (2017)
The Cryosphere
Understanding rock slope kinematics in steep, fractured bedrock permafrost is a challenging task. Recent laboratory studies have provided enhanced understanding of rock fatigue and fracturing in cold environments but were not successfully confirmed by field studies. This study presents a unique time series of fracture kinematics, rock temperatures and environmental conditions at 3500 m a. s. l. on the steep, strongly fractured Hörnligrat of the Matterhorn (Swiss Alps). Thanks to 8 years of continuous data, the longer-term evolution of fracture kinematics in permafrost can be analyzed with an unprecedented level of detail. Evidence for common trends in spatiotemporal pattern of fracture kinematics could be found: a partly reversible seasonal movement can be observed at all locations, with variable amplitudes. In the wider context of rock slope stability assessment, we propose separating reversible (elastic) components of fracture kinematics, caused by thermoelastic strains, from the irreversible (plastic) component due to other processes. A regression analysis between temperature and fracture displacement shows that all instrumented fractures exhibit reversible displacements that dominate fracture kinematics in winter. Furthermore, removing this reversible component from the observed displacement enables us to quantify the irreversible component. From this, a new metric – termed index of irreversibility – is proposed to quantify relative irreversibility of fracture kinematics. This new index can identify periods when fracture displacements are dominated by irreversible processes. For many sensors, irreversible enhanced fracture displacement is observed in summer and its initiation coincides with the onset of positive rock temperatures. This likely indicates thawing-related processes, such as meltwater percolation into fractures, as a forcing mechanism for irreversible displacements. For a few instrumented fractures, irreversible displacements were found at the onset of the freezing period, suggesting that cryogenic processes act as a driving factor through increasing ice pressure. The proposed analysis provides a tool for investigating and better understanding processes related to irreversible kinematics.

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Samuel Weber

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