Alex Hatem is a research geologist at USGS. Her research is focused on how to best describe the behavior of active faults in the recent past. She uses methods such as paleoseismology, slip rate studies, topographic analysis, numerical modeling and tectonic reconstructions to understand how earthquakes occur in space and time, both on single faults and within larger fault systems. Overall, she is interested in how faults evolve over time and characterizing variability and evolution of fault behavior on across different space-time scales. An overarching goal of her work is to understand how to represent geological constraints within hazard models, like the National Seismic Hazard Map and the Uniform California Earthquake Rupture Forecast.