Jeong-Heon Choi

• PhD
• Principal Researcher at Korea Basic Science Institute

Earthquake prediction in intraplate regions, such as the Korean Peninsula, is challenging due to the complexity of fault distributions. This study employed diverse methods and data sources to investigate Quaternary surface rupturing along the Yangsan Fault, aiming to understand its long-term earthquake behavior. Paleoseismic data from the Byeokgye...

This study aims to establish evaluation criteria for selecting suitable scintillators by investigating how inorganic scintillators respond to particle radiation, particularly electron beams. We conducted a radiation tolerance study of inorganic scintillators irradiated with a 6 MeV electron beam, examining factors such as beam energy, radiation dos...

Earthquake prediction in intraplate regions, such as South Korea, is challenging due to the complexity of fault zones. This study employed diverse methods and data sources to detect Quaternary surface rupturing along the Yangsan Fault to improve seismic hazard assessment. Paleoseismic data were analyzed to reveal insights into seismic activity, dis...

The Yangsan fault is the most prominent NNE-SSW−striking active right-lateral strike-slip fault crossing the Korean Peninsula, with a continuous trace of ∼200 km. It can likely generate large earthquakes; however, the paleoseismic information on slip per event, slip rate, and timing of past ruptures along this fault remains sparse. To explore these...

The 2017 Pohang earthquake (ML 5.4) ranks as the second-largest instrumental earthquake in the Korean Peninsula and the country’s most destructive seismic event. The earthquake history of the Pohang area prior to the 2017 event is unknown due to the absence of instrumental seismic activity and the lack of mapped Quaternary faults near the 2017 epic...

Landscapes are formed by long-term interactions between the underlying geology and climatic, edaphic and biotic factors, including human activity. The Kasitu Valley in the Mzimba District of northern Malawi includes the Kasitu River and its adjacent floodplains and uplands, and it has been a location of sustained human occupation since at least 16...

The Amazon Basin currently hosts the world’s largest pool of terrestrial biodiversity and prior to European colonization of the Americas there were large human communities living in parkland ecosystems. We examine the formation of archaeological sites in the northeast sector of the Caxiuanã National Forest (CNF) using light stable isotopes of nitro...

In this study, we conducted a geomorphologic analysis, fieldwork, geophysical survey, and trench survey to trace the Quaternary faulting along the northern Yangsan fault. We also complement the study with the Electron Spin Resonance and luminescence datings of the fault rocks and Quaternary sediments, respectively, to constrain the timing of the Qu...

Mwanganda's Village (MGD) and Bruce (BRU) are two open-air site complexes in northern Malawi with deposits dating to between 15 and 58 thousand years ago (ka) and containing Middle Stone Age (MSA) lithic assemblages. The sites have been known since 1966 and 1965, respectively, but lacked chronometric and site formation data necessary for their inte...

Korea's Paleolithic sites are primarily located in riverine environments and the margins of alluvial fans. More than 100 Paleolithic excavations have been conducted in the Korean Peninsula, but the relationship between the locations of these sites and past climate change has received little attention. In this study, we investigated this relationshi...

In seismic hazard assessment, subsurface geophysical surveying has gained popularity in recent years towards fault mapping and determining seismic deformation parameters such as fault offset, recurrence, and depth of fault, locating proper trench sites based on the subsurface information. In the present study, electrical resistivity tomography (ERT...

In the last few years, substantial amount of archaeological remains, which belong to the Bronze and the Iron Ages, has been excavated in Jungdo, central part of Korean peninsula, indicating that the prehistoric (partly, early historic) cultures had been flourished in this area. Particularly, more than 150 dolmens were found during the excavation ca...

Modern Homo sapiens engage in substantial ecosystem modification, but it is difficult to detect the origins or early consequences of these behaviors. Archaeological, geochronological, geomorphological, and paleoenviron-mental data from northern Malawi document a changing relationship between forager presence, ecosystem organization, and alluvial fa...

In optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dating, the performance of the single-aliquot regenerative-dose (SAR) protocol is commonly tested using a dose recovery test. The dependence of equivalent dose (De) determined in a dose recovery test on preheating temperature using quartz OSL was reported in previous studies which demonstrated that using a...

The Cheorwon area of South Korea has several records of the Quaternary faulting along the Chugaryung fault system and volcanic activity (Hantangang River Basalt). The most recent faulting event occurred along a segment of the Wangsukcheon fault (ca. 210 ka). In this study, a 5-m-deep trench was examined at the northern end of the Cheorwon Plain. Th...

In this study, we conduct structural characterization and Anisotropy of Magnetic Susceptibility (AMS) analysis of the Quaternary fault, and the OSL/IRSL age dating for the Quaternary sediments to identify the characteristics and timing of the Quaternary faulting events for which the fault is found through trench survey at Dangu-ri, Gyeongju-si, SE...

Obtaining a reliable age of the latest seismic slip event along an active fault is important for seismic hazard assessment. Here, we observe changes in the optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) signal of quartz crystals due to frictional heating in artificial fault gouges (comprising a mixture of quartz grains and Ca-bentonite powder). The fault...

The introduction of agriculture is known to have profoundly affected the ecological complexion of landscapes. In this study, a rapid transition from C 3 to C 4 vegetation is inferred from a shift to higher stable carbon ( ¹³ C/ ¹² C) isotope ratios of soils and sediments in the Benoué River Valley and upland Fali Mountains in northern Cameroon. Lan...

Jeju Island, which lies on the continental shelf in the southern Korean Peninsula, is the emergent portion of a basaltic volcanic field that has erupted since the Early Pleistocene (ca. 1.8 Ma). Volcanic activity that continued into historic times (ca. 1 ka) formed an elongated shield with a central edifice (Mt. Halla) and more than 300 monogenetic...

Records of past sea levels, storms, and their impacts on coastlines are crucial for forecasting and managing future changes resulting from anthropogenic global warming. Coastal barriers that have prograded over the Holocene preserve within their accreting sands a history of storm erosion and changes in sea level. High-resolution geophysics, geochro...

Reconstructing how rivers respond to changes in runoff or sediment supply by incising or aggrading has been pivotal in gauging the role of the Indian Summer Monsoon (ISM) as a geomorphic driver in the Himalayas. Here we present new chronological data for fluvial aggradation and incision from the Donga alluvial fan and the upper Alaknanda River, as...

The Udu-dong archeological site in Chuncheon, South Korea, dates back to the Proto–Three Kingdoms Period (approximately 100 BC to AD 350). Many artifacts, including some earthenware, have been excavated in these ancient dwelling sites. We applied three geochronological dating methods (radiocarbon, optically stimulated luminescence (OSL), and archeo...

Records of past sea levels, storms, and their impacts on coastline are crucial in forecasting future changes resulting from anthropogenic global warming. Coastal barriers that have prograded over the Holocene preserve within their accreting sands history of storm erosion and changes in sea level. High-resolution geophysics, geochronology, and remot...

The Late Pleistocene Middle Stone Age (MSA) record of Africa provides early examples of standardised stone tool production and complex manufacturing sequences, superficially implying a long-term trend towards greater complexity in MSA technology at a continental scale. However, at this scale, spatial and temporal expressions of technological comple...

The Iron Age settlements of northern Cameroon were dispersed across the landscape, taking advantage of different eco-climatic zones to exploit a variety of natural resources. Situated at the interface of the upper and lower terraces of the Benue River, mound sites in the area around Garoua have occupation histories spanning multiple centuries. The...

The Dasari beach-dune system fronted by an intertidal mud flat is a typical example of numerous small beaches found both in embayments and along the open macrotidal west coast of Korea. The beach is frequently exposed to energetic wave action at high tide in winter. Although this coastal dune-sandy beach-intertidal mud flat system has previously be...

The Quaternary Seooe fault outcrop observed in cut slope of road construction, Seooe-ri, Goseong-gun, Gyeongsangnam-do, is the first discovered Quaternary fault in the southern coastal area of Gyeongnam. This study presents its structural features, such as geometry and kinematics, and discusses the movement timing and associated earthquake magnitud...

The Quaternary Seooe fault outcrop observed in cut slope of road construction, Seooe-ri, Goseong-gun, Gyeongsangnam-do, is the first discovered Quaternary fault in the southern coastal area of Gyeongnam. This study presents its structural features, such as geometry and kinematics, and discusses the movement timing and associated earthquake magnitud...

In this paper, in order to test the possibility of applying K feldspar pIR-IRSL_{290} signal(read out at 290^{\circ}C) to date old terrace sediments(up to ~ 200 ka, MIS 7) in Korea, we investigated luminescence properties of pIR-IRSL_{290} signals in K feldspar extracts from 27 marine and fluvial terrace sediment samples, and these were compared wi...

Dougherty, A.J.; Choi, J-H., and Dosseto, A., 2016. Prograded Barriers GPR OSL Insight on coastal change over intermediate spatial and temporal scales. In: Vila-Concejo, A.; Bruce, E.; Kennedy, D.M., and McCarroll, R.J. (eds.), Proceedings of the 14th International Coastal Symposium (Sydney, Australia). Journal of Coastal Research, Special Issue, N...

The Southern Montane Forest-Grassland mosaic ecosystem in the humid subtropics southern Rift Valley of Africa comprised the environmental context for a large area in which modern human evolution and dispersal occurred. Variable climatic conditions during the Late Pleistocene have ranged between humid and hyperarid, changing the character of the eco...

Present study is an attempt to test the applicability of recently developed natural sensitivity corrected single aliquot regeneration (NCF-SAR) protocol for samples from archaeological sites of South Korea. The protocol monitors the sensitivity change during measurement of natural OSL (Optically Stimulated Luminescence) signal and provides a method...

Quaternary basaltic rocks occur as volcanic plateau and/or river cliff in the watershed area of Hantan River in Jeongok, central Korea. We measured ^{40}Ar-^{39}Ar ages for the basaltic rocks from Jeongok area using the multi-collector noble gas mass spectrometer and laser heating device introduced for the first time in Korea. The basaltic rocks fr...

In this paper, we report new OSL ages of the marine terrace sediments at Suryum fault site, using single grains of quartz, and briefly discuss their chronological implications on the timing of terrace formation along the southeastern coast of Korea. Of 1200 grains measured, 93 quartz grains were found to have OSL properties suitable for dating, the...

The Korean Peninsula is located in the intraplate regime of the Eurasian plate, and numerous historical and instrumental earthquakes have been recorded. Among these, the largest earthquakes were recorded in and around the Gyeongju and Ulsan areas in the southeastern part of the Korean Peninsula. We recently reexamined faults in Jinhyun and Jintee,...

The Osip-cheon River flows along a linear valley that runs approximately parallel to the Osip-cheon Fault. The present study was undertaken to elucidate the tectono-geomorphic evolution of the Osip-cheon Basin during the late Quaternary by employing cosmogenic 10Be surface exposure dating and optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dating on a flig...

The signal properties of quartz optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) vary from sample to sample, and even from grain to grain, in terms of, for example, signal intensity or the composition of OSL signal components. However, the cause of the variation in quartz OSL properties is not well understood. Here, we report our experimental observations o...

Paleolithic stone artifacts in Korea typically occur in brown clayesilt (BCS) sequences. The origin and depositional environment of these sequences are important for reconstructing the paleoenvironment as well as for establishing chronologies of artifact-bearing stratigraphic units. We investigated four BCSbearing sections in foothills and river an...

Coastal dunefields along the east coast of Korea have long been thought to have originated from beach ridges that prograded during the Holocene, but there has been little chronological evidence based on absolute dating. In this paper, we use optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dating and ground- penetrating radar (GPR) surveys to reconstruct th...

The thorium and uranium concentrations of four marine sediment reference materials (CRMs NIST 1646a, NRCC HISS-1, MESS-3 and PACS-2) were determined using isotope dilution-multiple collector-inductively coupled plasmas-mass spectrometry (ID-MC-ICP-MS), aiming at helping the assessment of reliability in dose rate estimation for luminescence dating....

Recently, a fallen Buddha statue of the late-8th century was discovered in Mt. Nam, Gyeongju, SE Korea. The Gyeongju area is located in intersection of two major young structural features in Korea: the Yangsan and Ulsan faults. According to historical records, such as the ancient texts of Samguksagi, Chaljubongi, and Mukseojipyeon, the studied area...

OSL dating on sedimentary quartz grains from two archaeological sites in Korea, called Hahwagye-ri and Hwadae-ri, was undertaken to aid archaeological interpretation for the migratory routes of the Upper Palaeolithic and Mesolithic people in Korea. The Hahwagye-ri site is located on a river terrace of the North Han river at Kangwon prefecture and t...

Both radiocarbon and optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dating methods were applied to test their suitability for establishing a chronology of arid-zone lacustrine sediments using a 5.88-m-long core drilled from Lake Ulaan, southern Mongolia. Although the radiocarbon and OSL ages agree in some samples, the radiocarbon ages are older than the c...

Using a newly developed small X-ray irradiator equipped with a mini X-ray generator (Varian VF-50J) and TR-OSL measurement system attached to an MCS (ORTEC MCS-PCI), the influence of dose and dose rate of X-ray radiation on TR-OSL was investigated in paleosol quartz from the Chungdang-dong paleolithic site, Korea. All lifetimes were calculated by a...

Gamma-ray spectrometry has been widely used in various environmental and natural sciences by its ability to determine the concentrations of each radionuclide of the samples, and also because of the easiness in sample preparation and measurement procedures. Recently, its applicability is being extended for Quaternary geochronology, by providing info...

Coastal dunefields along the east coast of Korea were thought to be originated from the beach ridges and to have been prograded seaward during the Holocene without any absolute chronology. The optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dating method and the ground penetrating radar (GPR) survey were used to reconstruct the history of coastal progradat...

Optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) of quartz is commonly applied to the age dating of Quaternary sediments. However, one of the issues is that some of the quartz samples are not suitable to OSL dating. Mineralogical analysis of the quartz samples with diverse OSL signals are required to strengthen the reliability and applicability of the OSL d...

Luminescence dating is unique amongst geochronological methods because it directly dates the time of deposition of sediments using some of the commonest detrital minerals on the earth's surface: quartz and feldspar (Duller, 2004). There has been considerable development in luminescence dating methods over the last 5?10 years, and it is now a reliab...

In this paper, the dependence of dose recovery tests on the different bleaching light sources (blue-LEDs, solar simulator, natural sunlight) is investigated with a variety of sedimentary quartz samples, selected so that their OSL signals are dominated by the fast OSL component. We observed that when long solar simulator bleaching was applied, vario...

Several flights of marine terraces can be identified along the southeastern coast of Korea. In the Yonghan area, the northern part of this coastline, three sets of marine terraces are usually identifiable; NQt1 (ca. 4 m), NQt2 (ca. 15 m) and NQt3 (ca. 35 m). Aeolian dune sands are well preserved on top of each terrace surface, underlain by palaeo-b...

Editorial Luminescence dating can provide ages for the deposition of sediments using the commonest minerals on the Earth, quartz and feldspar, for the past 150 ka. These methods provide a powerful tool to reconstruct the timing of past environmental events and tectonic movements, especially where other radiometric dating methods are not applicable...

Previous studies of Holocene sea-level change along the Yellow Sea coastline present conflicting reconstructions, and such investigations have invariably used peat as well as other biological markers as paleo-indicators of relative sea level. An alternative proxy indicator of sea-level change is employed in this study by applying the luminescence d...

Most irradiated quartz samples show a fast decaying CW-OSL (continuous-wave optically stimulated luminescence) signal known as the fast component (FC, which is well separated from the more slowly decaying components and is commonly used for dosimetry. Some quartz samples additionally show an OSL signal that decays much more rapidly than the FC, ter...

Red TL (RTL) emission quartz has potential benefit for luminescence dating, due to the high dose saturation level and long-term stability of the TL signal. Concerning the equivalent dose determination, we investigated whether the single aliquot regenerative-dose (SAR) TL protocol would be successful in the case of RTL quartz from Japan. For the inv...

Jeju Island, the largest Quaternary volcanic island in Korea, has formed mostly since the early Pleistocene, but its latest chronology of volcanism and sedimentation is still poorly constrained. Here we report optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) ages for two hydromagmatic volcanoes on the southwestern coast of Jeju Island, i.e., the Songaksan a...

Optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dating was applied to quartz samples recovered from the gravel sediments of deformed marine terrace at the Suryum site, southeastern Korea, but has yielded stratigraphically inconsistent ages. Micromorphological, chemical, and mineralogical analyses of the gravels indicate the possible influence of chemical w...

Geomorphological changes in the Kangneung area along the east coast of Korea were studied through analysis of topographic maps, aerial photographs and sedimentological characteristics of the coastal deposits. Luminescence dating techniques were used to provide depositional chronologies of the sediments. The study area can be classified into various...

A vertebrate burrow-bearing layer of late Pleistocene age is commonly found at many Paleolithic archaeological sites in Korea. The burrows are straight to slightly curved in horizontal (plan) view and gently inclined in lateral (sectional) view. They are interpreted as having been produced by rodent-like mammals based on their size and architecture...

Linearly modulated (LM) optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) measurements have revealed that some sedimentary quartz samples from the Kenyan Rift Valley do not have a fast OSL component, but contain a medium component and several slow components. It was impossible to recover a known dose for these samples using the conventional single-aliquot re...

Measurement of the optically stimulated luminescence signal during linear ramping of the stimulation power (LM-OSL) is a useful and efficient method for separating constituent OSL components, and for detailed investigation of the luminescence properties of each component. However, the practical procedures for the analysis of the quartz LM-OSL signa...

Optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) from quartz is now widely applied to the dating of Quaternary sediments. Unfortunately, quartz OSL ages are often limited to 100–200 ka by the saturation level of the dose–response curve (∼300 Gy), unless the annual dose from the surrounding sediments is sufficiently low. Quartz thermoluminescence (TL) has be...

The single aliquot regenerative-dose (SAR) protocol is now widely used as a means of measuring the equivalent dose, and hence of dating, as applied to the optical stimulation of luminescence from quartz. For equivalent dose determination of heated quartz, a similar protocol but using thermoluminescence is presented and the results by this protocol...

The single aliquot regenerative-dose (SAR) protocol is now widely used as a means of measuring the equivalent dose, and hence of dating, as applied to the optical stimulation of luminescence from quartz. For equivalent dose determination of heated quartz, a similar protocol but using thermoluminescence is presented and the results by this protocol...

Luminescence dating of a coastal dune from the Shindu dunefield on the T'aean Peninsula shows that deposition of the dune structure began about 500 -600 years ago. The lower section of the dune has remained stable since then but the upper part yields an age of about 30 years, suggesting reactivation or additional deposition since the 1970's. The tw...

Along the southeastern coastline of the Korean peninsula, well-developed marine terraces are found at various elevations. The ages of these terraces, and the time of deposition of the terrace sediments are important to our understanding of the geological history of this area during the Quaternary period, and represent a unique record of the regiona...

Several sets of marine terraces are exposed along the southeastern coast of the Korean peninsula. The formation ages of these terraces have attracted considerable attention because they provide essential information on local crustal stability. Over the last few years considerable effort has been put into the determination of these ages using optica...

The time-integrated slip rate in fault zones can be determined if the deformed deposits are reliably dated. Here, we report optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) ages of Late Pleistocene fluvial deposits cut by the Wangsan fault, southeastern Korea, which displaces a hanging wall block of about 28 m. Five sandy samples of the deformed Quaternary...