The Central and East European Earthquake Research Network (CE3RN): current status and future perspectives

In order to improve the monitoring of seismic activities in the border regions and to enhance the collaboration between countries and seismological institutions in Central Europe, the Slovenian Environment Agency (ARSO), the Italian National Institute for Oceanography and Experimental Geophysics (OGS), the University of Trieste (UniTS) and the Austrian Central Institute for Meteorology and Geodynamics (ZAMG) established in 2001 the “South Eastern Alps Transfrontier Seismological Network”. In May 2014 ARSO, OGS, UniTS and ZAMG agreed to formalize the transfrontier network, to name it “Central and East European Earthquake Research Network”, (CE3RN or CE3R Network, http://www.ce3rn.eu/) in order to locate it geographically since cross-border networks can be established in other areas of the world and to expand their cooperation, including institutions in other countries (Bragato et al., 2014). The University of Zagreb (UniZG) joined CE3RN in October 2014. The Kövesligethy Radó Seismological Observatory (KRSZO) of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences joined CE3RN in October 2015. The Institute of Geosciences, Energy, Water and Environment (IGEWE) of the Polytechnic University of Tirana joined CE3RN in November 2015. The Institute of Physics of the Earth (IPE) of the Masaryk University in Brno joined CE3RN in November 2015. The National Institute of Geophysics, Geodesy and Geography (NIGGG) of the Bulgarian Academy of Science in Sofia joined CE3RN in February 2016. The Romanian National Institute for Earth Physics (NIEP) in Bucharest joined CE3RN in March 2016. CE3RN Parties intend to formalize and possibly extend their ongoing cooperation in the field of seismological data acquisition, exchange and use for seismological and earthquake engineering and civil protection purposes. The purpose of this cooperation is to retain and expand the existing cross-border network, specify the rules of conduct in the network management, improvements, extensions and enlargements, enhance seismological research in the region, and support civil protection activities. Since the formal establishment of CE3RN, several common projects have been completed, like the SeismoSAT project (Pesaresi et al., 2016) for the seismic data centre connection over satellite funded by the Interreg IV Italia-Austria program, and the Earthquake Early Warning System (EEWS) PRESTo@CE3RN (Picozzi et al., 2015). We will here briefly introduce original and new CE3RN Parties, with a synthesis of the common results achieved so far and an indication of possible future developments.