Volcano unrest

A great majority of the world's potentially active volcanoes are unmonitored. Less than twenty-five percent of the volcanoes that are known to have had eruptions in historical times are monitored at all. Moreover, seventy-five percent of the largest explosive eruptions since 1800 occurred at volcanoes that had no previous historical eruptions. Being able to quickly react to volcanic unrest at so far not well or unmonitored volcanoes is therefore a social challenge not in the least because the danger associated with volcanoes is not only restricted to their eruption, but also includes earthquakes, dangerous gases, flank movement and other deformation, tsunamis, landslides, and even climatic changes. Defining criteria by which to forecast volcanic eruptions is therefore the most fundamental goal of volcanological research and it is a mandatory prerequisite for any successful hazard mitigation strategy associated with volcanic activity and critically depends on a full understanding of volcanic systems.

Eruptive potential

The basic question of why volcanoes become restless and erupt is not trivial. In fact, it is a fundamental problem because only a small fraction of magmas generated at depth ever reaches the surface. One of the keys to understand the eruptive potential of a volcanic system is our ability to characterize the actual state of stress of a volcanic system and to understand how susceptible the system is to small parameter changes. Whereas the first task involves proper monitoring strategies including novel ground and space based observation methods, the second one is concerned with understanding the response of volcanic systems to various forces acting on them. This requires an in depth modeling approach to understand so far unexplored internal feedback mechanisms in volcanic systems. Only then we will be able to identify a near critical state, and understand how small changes in system parameters may well be the decisive factor for the "final push" of magma ascent.

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