Issues

The cover image shows a dramatic aerial view of the Baihetan hydroelectric dam on the Jinsha River in southwest China. Construction started in August 2017, and on December 20, 2022, the Baihetan Hydropower Station was formally completed as the second largest hydropower plant in the world. Located at the border of the Sichuan and Yunnan provinces, this area between the tectonic blocks of the South China Craton and the Longmenshan is a region of naturally occuring seismicity. Since October 2021, an array of 15 short-period seismometers monitors the seismicity around the Baihetan hydropower station. In their article “Real-Time Local Shear-Wave Splitting Measurement: Application to the Vicinity of the Baihetan Hydropower Plant,” Han et al. (2025, this issue) report on real-time shear-wave splitting observations that show time-dependence in anisotropy directions related to the level of water filling in the dam.

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