Veleda Muller
Postdoc at the University of Arizona,
Arizona LaserChron Center
I am a geologist focusing on Cordilleran tectonics and how the topography shapes and is shaped by climate-driven surface processes. I am interested in lithospheric processes forming fold-and-thrust belts, metamorphic complexes, and magmatic arcs, and in the surface response to these processes, for example river incision and glacial erosion. As those interactions are very dynamic and overlap different Earth sciences, I integrate field work, laboratory techniques focused on geo-thermochronology, and numerical modeling of geodynamic, thermodynamic, and surface processes.
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I am passionated by both low- and high- temperature processes happening at the Earth's lithosphere. While low-temperature thermochronology gives us information about topography development, including tectonic deformation and surface processes, high-temperature processes are resposible by ductile deformation, shear zones, and magmatism, key elements of subduction and collisional systems. One of my current goals is to bridge low and high temperature thermochronology and understand mountain building in the big picture.
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My postdoc at the University of Arizona was funded by the NSF TANGO (TransANdean Great Orogeny) Collaborative Project (2023-2025), and is currently funded by the Arizona LaserChron Center. I am soon transitioning to an Assistant Professor role in the University of Alaska-Fairbanks. At the UAF I will teach Structural Geology and Tectonics and develop my research in Cordilleran accretionary belts, studying the partitioning between strike-slip and compressive tectonics and the geomorphic response to these processes.
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EPSS UCLA Colloquium Talk
I am giving a Colloquium talk at the Earth and Planetary & Space Sciences Department of the University of California Los Angeles on January 13th 2026. I am very excited to visit this vibrant and interdisciplinary department and present my postdoc work from the NSF TANGO Project at the University of Arizona. Find the details at https://epss.ucla.edu/epss-colloquium/ and feel free to join online or in person. Title: Tectonic and climate controls on the growth of the Andes: linking data and models, time: 3:30 pm PST.​
Session TS4.1 Shaping Orogens through space & time: linking deep processes to surface evolution, EGU 2026, Vienna 3-8 May 2026
I am co-convening this session at EGU 2026 with Francesca Stendardi, Francesca Rossetti, Santiago Leon, and Paolo Ballato. We welcome contributions from several disciplines that explore how deep-Earth and surface processes shape orogenic systems and control their spatial and temporal evolution. Submit your abstract at https://www.egu26.eu/session/56651
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GSA Connects 2025 San Antonio, TX
Outcomes
In San Antonio with colleagues from Chile
At GSA with colleagues from the University of Arizona
My first GSA Connects meeting was a success in terms of science and community building.
Chairing with my colleagues Dr. Tshering Lama Sherpa, Dr. Gilby Jepson, and Dr. Joel Leonard, our "Exploring Feedbacks Between Tectonics and Climate on Lithospheric Evolution" session had great talks and community engagement. Professors Kate Huntington and Julie Fosdick presented invited talks about their inovative studies in the Himalayas and the Andes.
I presented both sides of my current research: my Geodynamic modeling experiments of erosion control on lithospheric deformation, and my new thermochronology dataset for the Argentine Eastern Cordillera as an invited speaker in the "Building the South American Cordillera" session.
I also connected with colleagues and collaborators from South and North America, remebering adventurous fieldtrips in Patagonia and planning new research for the future!​
Room during our session "Exploring Feedbacks Between Tectonics and Climate on Lithospheric Evolution"
AGU24 talk: Tectonic shortening vs. mantle dynamic control on the topography and subsidence of the Central and Southern Andes using numerical modeling
During my first AGU meeting I was chairing the poster and oral session "From the Surface to the Mantle: Integrating Geophysical, Seismological, and Tectonics Perspectives Along the South American Margin".
It was the first time I presented results of my postdoc at the University of Arizona, regarding the numerical modeling component of the TANGO Project that I am developing.
In my talk I showed that mantle viscosity might be one of the fisrt-order controls on intraplate coupling in a subduction setting, consquently controlling the amount of crustal shortening in the upper plate. We compared the results with the lithospheric structure of the Central, Southern and Patagonian Andes.
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AGU24 took place in Washington D.C. in December 9-13, 2024.
Muller et al. (2024), Tectonics
My last first-author research article is published in Tectonics!
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I am so glad to publish the first dataset of low-temperature thermochronology from the Fitz Roy and Torres del Paine plutonic complexes in southern Patagonia! In these iconic granite towers we quantify the effects of mantle dynamics and glacial erosion along the southern Patagonian Andes.
This article highlight that both asthenospheric and surface processes drive the formation of the topography and landscape of alpine valleys, but sometimes one force predominate over each other, and in few cases we are capable to differentiate them.
Torres del Paine, Chilean Patagonia
(photo by Veleda Muller)
doi.org/10.5194/se-15-387-2024
Grey Glacier, Southern Patagonian Icefields, Chile
(photo by Veleda Muller)
My research article about the effect of the slab window on glacial isostatic adjustment in southern Patagonia is published in Solid Earth!
​Using forward numerical modeling, we show that the thermal anomaly generated by the slab window in southern Patagonia is necessary to generate the present-day outstanding uplift rates of 10-40 mm/yr measured by GPS around the Southern Patagonian Icefields.
​We also show that this high magnitude of uplift is generated by both the Little Ice Age (400 years ago) and the Last Glacial Maximum (20000 years ago).
Muller et al. (2024),
Solid Earth
Muller et al. (2022), Scientific Reports
My article "Climatic control on the location of volcanic arcs" is published on Nature portfolio!
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I used thermomechanical numerical modeling and a compilation of geochronology and thermochronology data to show that volcanic arcs can migrate in function of surface erosion. I used the Southern Andes and the North Cascade volcanic arcs as case studies, where the volcanism migrated towards the more eroded side of the orogenic belt. We propose this migration is entailed by the intensified orography associated with the westerlies winds.
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This article shows for the first time that orography can force volanic arc migration, revealing one more link between climate and tectonics.
Muller et al. (2021), Tectonophysics
My first research article about the closure of the Rocas Verdes Basin is published in Tectonophysics!
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This articles presents an integrated field-work, geochronology, petrology, and thermodynamic modeling study of the metamorphic rocks of the Magallanes fold-and-thrust belt, which were once the rocks of the backarc ocean-floored Rocas Verdes Basin in southern Patagonia.
​We show that this metavolcanic and sedimentary rocks experienced at least 20 km of tectonic burial in an accretionary wedge, and started to be exhumed in the Late Cretaceous. We show that this rocks record the passage from an extensional to a compressive tectonic setting in southern South America, when the Andes start to form and the southern tip of the continent start being bended.
Field pictures and photomicrographs of the mylonitic rocks of Tobífera Fm. at Estero Wickham, southern Patagonia, Chile
(photo by Veleda Muller)
About Veleda Muller
Welcome to my research website!
I am Veleda Muller, a geologist committed to perform new and interdisciplinary research in Geosciences, using field-work, laboratory, and modeling techniques. I am driven by a passion by mountains, nature, exploration, and curiosity about the dynamics of the Earth.