Related papers: Shear localisation controls the dynamics of earthq…
Earthquakes are rupture-like processes that propagate along tectonic faults and cause seismic waves. The propagation speed and final area of the rupture, which determine an earthquake's potential impact, are directly related to the nature…
Potential energy stored during the inter-seismic period by tectonic loading around faults is released during earthquakes as radiated energy, heat and fracture energy. The latter is of first importance since it controls the nucleation,…
Slow earthquakes differ from regular earthquakes in their slower moment release and size distribution dominated by smaller events. However, the physical origin of these slow earthquake statistics remains controversial. In this work, we…
We study strain localization as an enhanced velocity weakening mechanism on earthquake faults. Fault friction is modeled using Shear Transformation Zone (STZ) Theory, a microscopic physical model for non-affine rearrangements in granular…
We study experimentally the fluctuations of deformation along a shear fault naturally emerging within a compressed frictional granular medium. Using laser interferometry, we show that the deformation inside this granular gouge occurs as a…
The dynamic energy balance is essential for earthquake studies. The energy balance approach is one of the most famous developments in fracture mechanics. To interpret seismological data, crack models and sliding on a frictional surface…
Active faults release elastic strain energy via a whole continuum of modes of slip, ranging from devastating earthquakes to Slow Slip Events and persistent creep. Understanding the mechanisms controlling the occurrence of rapid, dynamic…
Friction plays a fundamental role in many natural processes, including earthquakes, landslides, and volcanic eruptions. Earthquakes occur when highly compressed fault surfaces accumulate large enough shear stresses, causing the faults to…
In subduction zones, seismic slip at shallow crustal depths can lead to the generation of tsunamis. Large slip displacements during tsunamogenic earthquakes are attributed to the low coseismic shear strength of the fluid-saturated and…
Seismic faults release the stress accumulated during tectonic movement through rapid ruptures or slow slip events. The slow slip events play a crucial role in the seismic cycle as they impact the occurrence of earthquakes. However, the…
Nearly all aspects of earthquake rupture are controlled by the friction along the fault that progressively increases with tectonic forcing, but in general cannot be directly measured. We show that fault friction can be determined at any…
Earthquakes vary in size over many orders of magnitude, yet the scaling of the earthquake energy budget remains enigmatic. We propose that fundamentally different "small-slip" and "large-slip" fracture processes govern earthquakes. We…
The localization of slow and fast slip in fault gouges may play a crucial role in understanding the mechanics of earthquakes and slow slip events. Here, we investigate the fracture energy accompanying this localization and the subsequent…
In the quest to determine fault weakening processes that govern earthquake mechanics, it is common to infer the earthquake breakdown energy from seismological measurements. Breakdown energy is observed to scale with slip, which is often…
A widespread framework for understanding frictional rupture, such as earthquakes along geological faults, invokes an analogy to ordinary cracks. A distinct feature of ordinary cracks is that their near edge fields are characterized by a…
A two dimensional amorphous material is modeled as an assembly of mesoscopic elemental pieces coupled together to form an elastically coherent structure. Plasticity is introduced as the existence of different minima in the energy landscape…
The traction evolution is a fundamental ingredient to model the dynamics of an earthquake rupture which ultimately controls, during the coseismic phase, the energy release, the stress redistribution and the consequent excitation of seismic…
The way granular materials response to an applied shear stress is of the utmost relevance to both human activities and natural environment. One of the their most intriguing and less understood behavior, is the stick-instability, whose most…
Shear rupture and fault slip in crystalline rocks like granite produce large dilation, impacting the spatiotemporal evolution of fluid pressure in the crust during the seismic cycle. To explore how fluid pressure variations are coupled to…
Although our existing one-dimensional (1D) model provides a successful quantitative description of rupture events, a 1D description is somewhat limited. We therefore derive a two-dimensional (2D) model which allows us to investigate…