Geology topics

Keith B. Richards-Dinger

Publications and source records attributed to Keith B. Richards-Dinger.

5 recordsLinked to original sources

USGS2021

Spatiotemporal clustering of great earthquakes on a transform fault controlled by geometry

Minor changes in geometry along the length of mature strike-slip faults may act as conditional barriers to earthquake rupture, terminating some and allowing others to pass. This hypothesis remains largely untested because palaeoearthquake data that constrain spatial and temporal patterns of fault rupture are generally imprecise. Here we develop palaeoearthquake event data that encompass the last 20 major-to-great earthquakes along approximately 320 km of the Alpine Fault in New Zealand with sufficient temporal resolution and spatial coverage to reveal along-strike patterns of rupture extent. The palaeoearthquake record shows that earthquake terminations tend to cluster in time near minor along-strike changes in geometry. These terminations limit the length to which rupture can grow and produce two modes of earthquake behaviour characterized by phases of major ( M w 7–8) and great ( M w > 8) earthquakes. Physics-based simulations of seismic cycles closely resemble our observations when parameterized with realistic fault geometry. Switching between the rupture modes emerges due to heterogeneous stress states that evolve over multiple seismic cycles in response to along-strike differences in geometry. These geometric complexities exert a first-order control on rupture behaviour that is not currently accounted for in fault-source models for seismic hazard.

South Island↗

USGS2021

Toward physics-based nonergodic PSHA: A prototype fully-deterministic seismic hazard model for southern California

We present a nonergodic framework for probabilistic seismic‐hazard analysis (PSHA) that is constructed entirely of deterministic, physical models. The use of deterministic ground‐motion simulations in PSHA calculations is not new (e.g., CyberShake), but prior studies relied on kinematic rupture generators to extend empirical earthquake rupture forecasts. Fully dynamic models, which simulate rupture nucleation and propagation of static and dynamic stresses, are still computationally intractable for the large simulation domains and many seismic cycles required to perform PSHA. Instead, we employ the Rate‐State earthquake simulator (RSQSim) to efficiently simulate hundreds of thousands of years of M ≥ 6.5 earthquake sequences on the California fault system. RSQSim produces full slip‐time histories for each rupture, which, unlike kinematic models, emerge from frictional properties, fault geometry, and stress transfer; all intrinsic variability is deterministic. We use these slip‐time histories directly as input to a 3D wave‐propagation code within the CyberShake platform to obtain simulated F max = 0.5 Hz ground motions. The resulting 3 s spectral acceleration ground motions closely match empirical ground‐motion model (GMM) estimates of median and variability of shaking. When computed over a range of sources and sites, the variability is similar to that of ergodic GMMs. Variability is reduced for individual pairs of sources and sites that repeatedly sample a single path, which is expected for a nonergodic model. This results in increased exceedance probabilities for certain characteristic ground motions for a source–site pair, while decreasing probabilities at the extreme tails of the ergodic GMM predictions. We present these comparisons and preliminary fully deterministic physics‐based RSQSim–CyberShake hazard curves, as well as a new technique for estimating within‐ and between‐event variability through simulation.

California↗

USGS2018

A physics-based earthquake simulator replicates seismic hazard statistics across California

Seismic hazard models are important for society, feeding into building codes and hazard mitigation efforts. These models, however, rest on many uncertain assumptions and are difficult to test observationally because of the long recurrence times of large earthquakes. Physics-based earthquake simulators offer a potentially helpful tool, but they face a vast range of fundamental scientific uncertainties. We compare a physics-based earthquake simulator against the latest seismic hazard model for California. Using only uniform parameters in the simulator, we find strikingly good agreement of the long-term shaking hazard compared with the California model. This ability to replicate statistically based seismic hazard estimates by a physics-based model cross-validates standard methods and provides a new alternative approach needing fewer inputs and assumptions for estimating hazard.

California↗

USGS2017

Delayed seismicity rate changes controlled by static stress transfer

On 15 June 2010, a M w 5.7 earthquake occurred near Ocotillo, California, in the Yuha Desert. This event was the largest aftershock of the 4 April 2010 M w 7.2 El Mayor-Cucapah (EMC) earthquake in this region. The EMC mainshock and subsequent Ocotillo aftershock provide an opportunity to test the Coulomb failure hypothesis (CFS). We explore the spatiotemporal correlation between seismicity rate changes and regions of positive and negative CFS change imparted by the Ocotillo event. Based on simple CFS calculations we divide the Yuha Desert into three subregions, one triggering zone and two stress shadow zones. We find the nominal triggering zone displays immediate triggering, one stress shadowed region experiences immediate quiescence, and the other nominal stress shadow undergoes an immediate rate increase followed by a delayed shutdown. We quantitatively model the spatiotemporal variation of earthquake rates by combining calculations of CFS change with the rate-state earthquake rate formulation of Dieterich (1994), assuming that each subregion contains a mixture of nucleation sources that experienced a CFS change of differing signs. Our modeling reproduces the observations, including the observed delay in the stress shadow effect in the third region following the Ocotillo aftershock. The delayed shadow effect occurs because of intrinsic differences in the amplitude of the rate response to positive and negative stress changes and the time constants for return to background rates for the two populations. We find that rate-state models of time-dependent earthquake rates are in good agreement with the observed rates and thus explain the complex spatiotemporal patterns of seismicity.

California↗

USGS2012

A comparison among observations and earthquake simulator results for the allcal2 California fault model

In order to understand earthquake hazards we would ideally have a statistical description of earthquakes for tens of thousands of years. Unfortunately the ∼100‐year instrumental, several 100‐year historical, and few 1000‐year paleoseismological records are woefully inadequate to provide a statistically significant record. Physics‐based earthquake simulators can generate arbitrarily long histories of earthquakes; thus they can provide a statistically meaningful history of simulated earthquakes. The question is, how realistic are these simulated histories? This purpose of this paper is to begin to answer that question. We compare the results between different simulators and with information that is known from the limited instrumental, historic, and paleoseismological data. As expected, the results from all the simulators show that the observational record is too short to properly represent the system behavior; therefore, although tests of the simulators against the limited observations are necessary, they are not a sufficient test of the simulators’ realism. The simulators appear to pass this necessary test. In addition, the physics‐based simulators show similar behavior even though there are large differences in the methodology. This suggests that they represent realistic behavior. Different assumptions concerning the constitutive properties of the faults do result in enhanced capabilities of some simulators. However, it appears that the similar behavior of the different simulators may result from the fault‐system geometry, slip rates, and assumed strength drops, along with the shared physics of stress transfer. This paper describes the results of running four earthquake simulators that are described elsewhere in this issue of Seismological Research Letters. The simulators ALLCAL (Ward, 2012), VIRTCAL (Sachs et al., 2012), RSQSim (Richards‐Dinger and Dieterich, 2012), and ViscoSim (Pollitz, 2012) were run on our most recent all‐California fault model, allcal2. With the exception of ViscoSim, which ran for 10,000 years, all the simulators ran for 30,000 years. Presentations containing content similar to this paper can be found at http://scec.usc.edu/research/eqsims/.

Seismological Research Letters↗