Thin elongated sources, such as dykes, sills, chimneys, inclined sheets, etc., often encountered in volcano gravimetric studies, pose great challenges to gravity inversion methods based on model exploration and growing sources bodies. The Growth inversion approach tested here is based on partitioning the subsurface into right-rectangular cells and populating the cells with differential densities in an iterative weighted mixed adjustment process, in which the minimization of the data misfit is balanced by forcing the growing subsurface density distribution into compact source bodies. How the Growth inversion can cope with thin elongated sources is the subject of our study. We use synthetic spatiotemporal gravity changes caused by simulated sources placed in three real volcanic settings. Our case studies demonstrate the benefits and limitations of the Growth inversion as applied to sparse and noisy gravity change data generated by thin elongated sources. Such sources cannot be reproduced by Growth accurately. They are imaged with smaller density contrasts, as much thicker, with exaggerated volume. Despite this drawback, the Growth inversion can provide useful information on several source parameters even for thin elongated sources, such as the position (including depth), the orientation, the length, and the mass, which is a key factor in volcano gravimetry. Since the density contrast of a source is not determined by the inversion, but preset by the user to run the inversion process, it cannot be used to specify the nature of the source process. The interpretation must be assisted by external constraints such as structural or tectonic controls, or volcanological context. Synthetic modeling and Growth inversions, such as those presented here, can serve also for optimizing the volcano monitoring gravimetric network design. We conclude that the Growth inversion methodology may, in principle, prove useful even for the detection of thin elongated sources of high density contrast by providing useful information on their position, shape (except for thickness) and mass, despite the strong ambiguity in determining their differential density and volume. However, this yielded information may be severely compromised in reality by the sparsity and noise of the interpreted gravity data.

Combination of microgravity and GPR method constrains each other and help to detect subsurface cavities in a very effective way. Several examples are presented, some of the data-set were acquired during common summer schools between Kiel University and Comenius University in Bratislava.

Two extensometer stations have been set up at the margin of the Pannonian Basin to monitor tectonic movements as well as Earth tides and related phenomena. Because the Sopronbánfalva Geodynamic Observatory (SGO) in Hungary and the Vyhne Tidal Station (VTS) in Slovakia are located in different geological, topographic, and tectonic environments, the analysis and comparison of the extensometer data measured here provides a useful opportunity to interpret the observed data. The tectonic deformation at the SGO shows an average contraction of: −2.94 μstr y−1 (1 μstr is 10−6 relative deformation) which can be explained by the uplift of the Alps and the anticlockwise motion of the Adria microplate, causing compression in the Eastern Alps. At the VTS an average compression of −14.8 nstr y−1 (1 nstr is 10−9 relative deformation) was measured which can be explained by the NW compression direction in this area. The measured deformations in both observatories show a good agreement with the results of GPS measurements. The deformation at the VTS is characterized by small dilatation anomalies caused by the different topographic, tectonic environment and probably by the high heat flow in the area of the station. At this station the calculated amplitude factors for O1, P1, K1, M2 are 1.01482, 1.21691, 0.83173, 1.09392 and the ocean load corrected values are 1.10817, 1.35717, 0.92809, 1.28812, respectively. At the SGO the calculated amplitude factors for the same tidal components are 0.58776, 0.38967, 0.41548, 1.00564 and the ocean load corrected values are 0.98893, 1.89117, 1.00430, 1.04962, respectively. These results show that the effect of the ocean tide loading is greater at Sopronbánfalva, than at Vyhne. Based on the comparison, we can say that the result of the local strain measurement can be considered realistic.