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Earthquake Nucleation Process

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Encyclopedia of Complexity and Systems Science

Definition of the Subject

Earthquake prediction in the long, intermediate, and short terms is essential for the reduction of earthquake disasters. However, it is notpractical at present, in particular, for the intermediate and short time scales of a few days to years. This is mainly because we do not know exactlyhow and why earthquakes begin and grow larger or stop. Theoretical and laboratory studies have confirmed that earthquakes do not begin abruptly withdynamic rupture propagation. They show that a quasi‐static rupture growth precedes dynamic rupture. Thus, if we can detect thequasi‐static rupture growth, we could forecast the following dynamic rupture. A key issue is how natural earthquakes initiate. To solve thisissue, a first approach would be to investigate the very beginning parts of observed waveforms of earthquakes, since they can reflect the earthquakenucleation process from a quasi‐static to a dynamic rupture. This paper reviews...

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Abbreviations

Nucleation process:

The process in which rupture velocity accelerates from quasi‐static to dynamic. The dynamic rupture velocity almost equals the shear wave velocity.

Nucleation zone:

The portion of the fault where rupture velocity accelerates from quasi‐static to dynamic.

Initial rupture process:

The rupture process that precedes the largest slip. This term is used when the acceleration of rupture velocity is not clear. This is a wider concept that includes the earthquake nucleation process. The area where the initial rupture process occurs is called the initial rupture fault.

Slip velocity:

The dislocation velocity at a point on the fault. The rupture velocity is the velocity at which the rupture front is expanding.

Preslip model:

An earthquake source model having a detectable size nucleation zone.

Cascade model:

An earthquake source model in which smaller sub‐events successively trigger larger sub‐events. A sub‐event is the same as a small earthquake if it does not trigger a successive sub‐event.

Stress drop (static stress drop):

The amount of shear stress change at a point on the fault before and after an earthquake. It is proportional to the strain released on the fault.

Dynamic stress drop:

The difference between the initial shear stress and the minimum frictional stress at a point on the fault during fault slip.

Fault strength:

The shear stress level necessary to initiate slip at a point on the fault.

M :

Magnitude. Earthquake size computed basically from waveform amplitudes and focal distances.

Seismic moment:

The most reliable measure of earthquake size which is determined from the products of the rigidity near the fault, the amount of slip, and the area of the fault surface.

M w :

Moment magnitude. Earthquake magnitude derived from the seismic moment.

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Acknowledgments

The project in the Western Nagano Prefecture is a co‐operative study with Shigeki Horiuchi, Shiro Ohmi, Hisao Ito, Yasuto Kuwahara,Eiji Yamamoto, Kentaro Omura, Koichi Miura, Bun'ichiro Shibazaki, and Haruo Sato. We thank James Mori and Masumi Yamada for their critical reviews of themanuscript. This work is partly supported by JSPS.KAKENHI (19204043), Japan. We are grateful for two anonymous reviewers for their critical andthoughtful comments.

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  1. Disaster Prevention Research Institute, Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan

    Yoshihisa Iio

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  1. RAMTECH LIMITED, 122 Escalle Lane, Larkspur, CA, 94939, USA

    Robert A. Meyers Ph. D. (Editor-in-Chief) (Editor-in-Chief)

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Iio, Y. (2009). Earthquake Nucleation Process . In: Meyers, R. (eds) Encyclopedia of Complexity and Systems Science. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-30440-3_154

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