Rocks in mountain belts have been deformed during continental collision causing a certain alignment of the minerals referred to as crystallographic preferred orientation (CPO). Minerals have anisotropic properties: the velocity of seismic waves travelling through them is direction dependent. This leads to anisotropy of the rocks. We measured the CPO of common rocks within the Alps. With this data and known anisotropic properties of the minerals we calculated the seismic anisotropy of the rocks.

Properties of deformed rocks are frequently anisotropic. One of these properties is the travel time of a seismic wave. In this study we measured the seismic anisotropy of different rocks, collected in the Alps. Our results show distinct differences between rocks of oceanic origin and those of continental origin.

Using rock deformation experiments we study how rocks deform at mid-crustal levels within mountain belts and along plate boundaries. For the studied material, fluid-assisted mass transport and grain sliding are the dominant deformation mechanisms when small amounts of water are present. Our results provide new data on the mechanical response of the earth's crust, and the wide range of presented microstructures will help to correlate observations from experiments and nature.

Quartz crystallographic preferred orientations (textures) are widely used to interpret conditions, kinematics or deformation mechanisms in deformed rocks. Textures of experimentally deformed quartzite were analyzed and we find that the finite texture is the result of two different texture-forming processes that depend on stress and strain but not directly on temperature. The findings help in the interpretation of deformation conditions from textures in naturally deformed rocks.