The New York Times reported on what experts are saying about a series of earthquakes that struck three seismically active regions — Japan, Northern California and Venezuela — within 24 hours. Neither earthquake in Japan nor California was close enough to transfer stress to the tectonic plates under Venezuela, said Martin Hudson, an expert in geotechnical engineering at UCLA. But the strength of the first Venezuelan quake could have triggered the second in the region. “The shaking of the first earthquake increases the stress on a nearby fault,” he said. “If the other one was close to going off anyway, it wouldn’t take much to set it off.” Read more about UCLA in today’s The Conversation, KCRW’s “Press Play” and others.