Cigala, Valeria

Place of Origin

Italy

Address

Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität (LMU)
Munich (GERMANY)

Appointment Time in VERTIGO

2014-06-16 – 2017-06-15

Post-Vertigo Employment

Since June 2017 employed at Università di Padova (Italy)

ResearchGate profile: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Valeria_Cigala

Project Title

A new look into explosive volcanic eruption: integrated shock-tube experiments, field- and laboratory-based high-speed imaging and textural characterisation of pyroclasts

Project Description

The aim of my current VERTIGO project is about the fragmentation process inside a volcano and the ejection dynamics of the gas-pyroclast mixture which are the closest witnesses of syn-eruptive processes. As the fragmentation process is beyond direct observation, we need to constrain other roads to increase our understanding of explosively erupting volcanoes and mitigate the associated hazards. So I will observe erupting volcanoes and laboratory experiments with high-speed video cameras and acoustic arrays, sample proximal deposits, analyze shock-tube experiments (fragmentation bomb) to quantify the influence of sample and experimental parameters, describe the textural properties of samples from field and experiments and model the particle ejection computationally.

Research Interests

Volcanology
Hazard assessment
Active volcanoes
Petrography

About me

I obtained my Bachelor degree at Università degli Studi Milano-Bicocca, Italy, in Geological Sciences and Technologies, with a project focused on the stratigraphy of Permiam volcanic rocks in Valganna, Varese, Italy. Later I got the opportunity to attend a double Master degree program Atlantis-INVOGE with focus on volcanology and geotechniques. This program allowed me to attend my first Master year at Università degli Studi Milano-Bicocca, Italy, and my second year at Michigan Technological University, Houghton, USA. My Master project focused on the textural characterization of volcanic ash from Pacaya Volcano, Guatemala. I have also done part of the work at the Laboratoire Magmas et Volcans, Clermont-Ferrand, France thanks to Erasmus funding.