Analogue modelling in Geosciences uncovered: a textbook for modern minds

Analogue modeling for Earth Sciences started over two centuries ago as an explorative technique that allowed for the first time unfolding and visualizing a wide range of tectonic processes. While this character remains a compelling feature of analogue models, this experimental methodology has evolved over the last few decades into a quantitative, reproducible and reliable method. Most recent developments aredispersed across scientific journal articles, many behind pay-walls and sometimes hidden in appendices, but no open-access overview exists that brings all this knowledge together.

In the context of the EU research infrastructure EPOS, we are preparing the first comprehensive guide (SPRINGER will publish that as open access) on the state-of-the-art in analogue modeling of geologic processes. This community-built book will be organized into three sections. The first section will serve as a “cookbook” for building analogue models, offering up-to-date guide on scaling down models, selecting suitable analog materials, collecting experimental data, and interpreting those results. The second section will focus on a variety of tectonic processes that can be reproduced in the lab and analyzed using analogue modelling. The final section will emphasize the importance of sharing experimental research data through Open Access data publications and illustrate how analogue models can enhance the Earth Science teaching experience in classrooms. This book will fill a significant gap in the scholarly literature and will serve as a reference and guide for both early-career and experienced researchers as well as reaching out to a broader community of educational and academic teachers. In this presentation, we will share our journey toward this community-effort and give examples of the different sections of the book.