deep earthquakes in subducting slabs hosted in highly anisotropic rock fabric analysis of deep subduction zone earthquakes those at depths greater than 60 km reveals the physical and chemical properties of a descending oceanic lithosphere at mantle depths over the past five decades it has been observed that a large fraction of deep earthquakes has non double couple non dc seismic radiation patterns in contrast shallow earthquakes tend to have dc radiation patterns due to mechanisms of shear faulting these observations have been used to argue that deep earthquakes rupture differently from shallow earthquakes here we show that the observed global distribution of non dc deep earthquakes could be caused by shear faulting mechanisms but in a highly anisotropic laminated rock fabric that surrounds the deep earthquakes within subducted slabs for intermediate depth earthquakes 60 300 km we found a large shear wave anisotropy of 25 possibly caused by laminated fabric or aligned melt pockets oriented parallel to the slab interface which provides new supporting evidence for the metamorphic dehydration reactions in slabs however at deep focus depths 300 km the putative metastable phase change mechanism alone cannot explain the seismic anisotropy instead our results and those from recent experiments suggest materials such as magnesite or perhaps carbonatite melt may play a role in generating deep focus earthquakes radiation patterns for deep earthquakes could be a result of shear faulting mechanisms similar to those for shallow earthquakes but in highly anisotropic rock fabric suggest seismic analyses

mid mantle seismic anisotropy around subduction zones abstract there is increasing evidence for mid mantle seismic anisotropy around subduction zones whose interpretation remains elusive in this study i estimate the strain induced mid mantle fabric and associated seismic anisotropy developing in 3d petrological thermo mechanical subduction models where the slab is either stagnating over the 660 km discontinuity or penetrating into the lower mantle the modelling of synthetic lattice preferred orientation lpo development of wadsleyite and perovskite has been calibrated with results from deformational experiments and ab initio atomic scale models and the single crystal elastic tensor of the different mineral phases is scaled by local p t conditions the lower transition zone ringwoodite garnet is assumed to be isotropic mid mantle fabric develops in proximity of the subducting slab where deformation and stresses are high except at depths where upwelling or downwelling material undergoes phase transformations yielding to lpo reset the upper transition zone wadsleyite garnet is characterized by weak transverse isotropy 2 3 with symmetry axes oriented and fast s wave polarized dip normal a slightly stronger transverse isotropy develops in the lower mantle perovskite periclase where the symmetry axes the polarization of the fast s wave and the maximum vp and dvs are parallel to the slab dip and subduction direction for stagnating slab models this translates into negative and positive radial anisotropy in the upper transition zone and lower mantle back arc respectively minimum delay times for vertically travelling shear waves and large shear wave splitting for waves propagating horizontally in the lower mantle these results may help in reconciling the seismic anisotropy patterns observed in some subduction zones with subduction induced deformation such as those measured in the mid mantle between the australian plate and the new hebrides tonga kermadec trenches that i interpret as related to stagnating portions of the subducted pacific plate

the shear wave velocity gradient at the base of the mantle the relative amplitudes and travel have been directed toward obtaining global times of scs and s phases are utilized to place averages and the degree of lateral variation in constraints on the shear wave velocity gradient d properties remains an open question above the core mantle boundary a previously a conflicting result was found by mitchell and reported long period scsh sh amplitude ratio helmberger 1973 who utilized the relative minimum in the distance range 65 o to 70 o is shown amplitudes and timing of long period scs and s to be a localized feature apparently produced by phases to constrain the s wave velocity gradient an amplitude anomaly in the direct s phase and in d they found a minimum in the scsh sh therefore need not reflect the velocity gradient amplitude ratio near 68 o which was attributed to at the base of the mantle the amplitude ratios low amplitudes of the scs arrivals unable to that are free of this anomaly are consistent with explain this feature by models with negative or calculations for the jb model or models with mild near zero shear velocity gradients in d they positive or negative velocity gradients in the proposed models with positive s wave velocity lowermost 200 km of the mantle scsv arrivals gradients above the cmb these positive are particularly sensitive to the shear velocity gradients extended over 40 to 70 km above the structure just above the core mantle boundary core reaching velocities at the cmb as high as the apparent arrival time of the peak of scsv is 7 6 to 7 8 km s these models can explain the as much as 4 sreater than that of scsh in the observed amplitude ratio behavior as well as an distance range 75 v to 80 o for sea of okhotsk apparent difference observed in the arrival times events recorded in north america this can be of transversely and radially polarized scs explained by interference effects produced by a mitchell and helmberger also proposed a low q localized high velocity layer or strong positive zone in d or finite outer core rigidity to s wave velocity gradient in the lowermost 20 km explain the baseline of the scsh sh amplitude of the mantle a velocity increase of about 5 ratios while the majority of their data was for is required to explain the observed shift between deep south american events recorded in north scsv and scsh this thin high velocity layer america they did analyze one deep sea of okhotsk varies laterally as it is not observed in event for which the radial and transverse scs similar data from argentine events refined arrival times were not different which suggested estimates of the outermost core p velocity lateral variations in the d velocity structure structure are obtained by modeling sks signals in in this paper we extend the analysis of scs the distance range 75 o to 85 o s

on crustal corrections in surface wave tomography summary mantle models from surface waves rely on good crustal corrections we investigated how far ray theoretical and finite frequency approximations can predict crustal corrections for fundamental mode surface waves using a spectral element method we calculated synthetic seismograms in transversely isotropic prem and in the 3 d crustal model crust2 0 on top of prem and measured the corresponding time shifts as a function of period we then applied phase corrections to the prem seismograms using ray theory and finite frequency theory with exact local phase velocity perturbations from crust2 0 and looked at the residual time shifts after crustal corrections residuals fall within the uncertainty of measured phase velocities for periods longer than 60 and 80 s for rayleigh and love waves respectively rayleigh and love waves are affected in a highly non linear way by the crustal type oceanic crust affects love waves stronger while rayleigh waves change most in continental crust as a consequence we find that the imperfect crustal corrections could have a large impact on our inferences of radial anisotropy if we want to map anisotropy correctly we should invert simultaneously for mantle and crust the latter can only be achieved by using perturbation theory from a good 3 d starting model or implementing full non linearity from a 1 d starting model

global shear speed structure of the upper mantle and transition zone s u m m a r y the rapid expansion of broad band seismic networks over the last decade has paved the way for a new generation of global tomographic models significantly improved resolution of global upper mantle and crustal structure can now be achieved provided that structural information is extracted effectively from both surface and body waves and that the effects of errors in the data are controlled and minimized here we present a new global vertically polarized shear speed model that yields considerable improvements in resolution compared to previous ones for a variety of features in the upper mantle and crust the model sl2013sv is constrained by an unprecedentedly large set of waveform fits 3 4 of a million broad band seismograms computed in seismogram dependent frequency bands up to a maximum period range of 11 450 s automated multimode inversion of surface and s wave forms was used to extract a set of linear equations with uncorrelated uncertainties from each seismogram the equations described perturbations in elastic structure within approximate sensitivity volumes between sources and receivers going beyond ray theory we calculated the phase of every mode at every frequency and its derivative with respect to sand p velocity perturbations by integration over a sensitivity area in a 3 d reference model the normally small perturbations of the 3 d model required to fit the waveforms were then linearized using these accurate derivatives the equations yielded by the waveform inversion of all the seismograms were simultaneously inverted for a 3 d model of shear and compressional speeds and azimuthal anisotropy within the crust and upper mantle elaborate outlier analysis was used to control the propagation of errors in the data source parameters timing at the stations etc the selection of only the most mutually consistent equations exploited the data redundancy provided by our data set and strongly reduced the effect of the errors increasing the resolution of the imaging our new shear speed model is parametrized on a triangular grid with a 280 km spacing in well sampled continental domains lateral resolution approaches or exceeds that of regionalscale studies the close match of known surface expressions of deep structure with the distribution of anomalies in the model provides a useful benchmark in oceanic regions spreading ridges are very well resolved with narrow anomalies in the shallow mantle closely confined near the ridge axis and those deeper down to 100 120 km showing variability in their width and location with respect to the ridge major subduction zones worldwide are well captured extending from shallow depths down to the transition zone the large size of our waveform fit data set also provides a strong statistical foundation to re examine the validity field of the jwkb approximation and surface wave ray theory our analysis shows that the approximations are likely to be valid within certain time frequency portions of most seismograms with high signal to noise ratios and these portions can be identified using a set of consistent criteria that we apply in the course of waveform fitting

evidence for shear velocity anisotropy in the lowermost mantle beneath the indian ocean teleseismic recordings 87 of a deep earthquake beneath the banda sea at stations in tanzania show a difference in the arrival time of the radial ssv and transverse component ssh s wave ranging from 1 3 s shear velocity anisotropy in the lowermost mantle beneath the indian ocean is the likely cause of this signal because recordings at the same stations of closer in events 80 in the same source region do not present a comparable differential travel time for the banda sea event the ssh signals are broader than ssv signals suggesting that a discontinuity or strong vertical gradient in primarily vsh marks the sudden onset of transverse isotropy in d with a magnitude of 1 4 2 7 about 350 km above the core mantle boundary skks coda s to p converted phases at the moho and upper mantle heterogeneity beneath the stations obscure the onset of ssv and complicate wave shapes it is therefore difficult to evaluate whether general anisotropy needs to be invoked into a model of shear velocity anisotropy

sp12rts a degree 12 model of shear and compressional wave velocity for earth s mantle we present the new model sp12rts of isotropic shear wave vs and compressional wave vp velocity variations in the earth s mantle sp12rts is derived using the same methods as employed in the construction of the shear wave velocity models s20rts and s40rts and the same data types sp12rts includes additional traveltime measurements of p waves and new splitting measurements 33 normal modes with sensitivity to the compressional wave velocity and 9 stoneley modes with sensitivity primarily to the lowermost mantle contrary to s20rts and s40rts variations in vs and vp are determined without invoking scaling relationships lateral velocity variations in sp12rts are parametrised using spherical harmonics up to degree 12 to focus on long wavelength features of vs and vp and their ratio r largelow velocity provinces llvps are observed for both vs and vp sp12rts also features an increase of r up to 2500 km depth followed by a decrease towards the core mantle boundary a negative correlation between the shear wave and bulk sound velocity variations is observed for both the llvps and the surrounding mantle these characteristics can be explained by the presence of post perovskite or large scale chemical heterogeneity in the lower mantle

a simple method for improving crustal corrections in waveform tomography summary accurate accounting for the effects of crustal structure on long period seismic surface waves and overtones is difficult but indispensable for determining elastic structure in the mantle while standard linear crustal corrections slc have been shown to be inadequate on the global scale newer non linear correction nlc techniques are computationally expensive when applied to waveforms containing higher frequencies and or overtones we devise implement and verify a modified slc approach that mimics the non linear effects of the crust without substantially increasing the computational costs while theoretically less accurate than the nlc approach in practice the reduced computational costs allow this modified linear correction mlc technique to be applied at higher frequencies and using more detailed crustal regionalizations than is possible with nlc in order to validate the mlc technique we use the spectral element method to carry out a series of synthetic tests these tests demonstrate that mlc nearly eliminates the contamination of mantle isotropic structure by unmodelled crustal effects which can be substantial in the uppermost 150 km when using slc furthermore we show that mlc significantly reduces contamination of anisotropic structure compared to slc the inaccuracies of which are significant in the upper 250 km and can even obliterate the mantle anisotropic signature at depths shallower than 100 km finally we apply the mlc technique to a real long period waveform data set and demonstrate the benefit of improved crustal corrections on the retrieved model

on the robustness of global radially anisotropic surface wave tomography a number of recent global tomographic studies have modeled three dimensional variations in the parameters of radial anisotropy as yet there is limited agreement among such studies suggesting significant uncertainties in the models which could lead to divergent geodynamical interpretations in this study we assess the robustness of lateral variations in radial anisotropy globally in the upper mantle and in the transition zone to determine the extent to which anisotropic parameters are constrained by a data set of over 10 000 000 fundamental and higher mode surface wave dispersion measurements we carry out inversions for isotropic and radially anisotropic shear wave velocity systematically changing regularization and using three different crustal models to remove the effects of the crust on the data using crustal corrections from different crustal models has an impact on the data fit comparable or larger than that obtained by including lateral variations of radial anisotropy in the modeling moreover the use of crustal corrections from different a priori crustal models may lead to different images of radial anisotropy suggesting divergent geodynamical interpretations this work suggests that the three dimensional determination of global radial anisotropy in the earth s mantle using surface wave dispersion data is still an ongoing experiment

analysis of seismic sv waves in the core s penumbra vertically polarized s waves sv attenuate rapidly as they diffract around the earth s core whereas horizontally polarized s waves sh propagate to large distances in the core shadow zone the amplitude decay of diffracted sv signals is so strong that few studies have been made of these phases despite their acute sensitivity to velocity structure just above the core mantle boundary we analyze sv signals in the penumbra of the core s shadow finding systematic waveform complexities indicative of local stratification and apparent anisotropy at the base of the mantle with implications for the dynamic processes in this internal boundary layer

anisotropic shear wave velocity structure of the earth s mantle a global model 1 we combine a new large data set of surface wave phase anomalies long period waveforms and body wave travel times to construct a three dimensional model of the anisotropic shear wave velocity in the earth s mantle our modeling approach is improved and more comprehensive compared to our earlier studies and involves the development and implementation of a new spherically symmetric reference model simultaneous inversion for velocity and anisotropy as well as discontinuity topographies and implementation of nonlinear crustal corrections for waveforms a comparison of our new three dimensional model s362ani with two other models derived from comparable data sets but using different techniques reveals persistent features 1 strong 200 km thick high velocity anomalies beneath cratons likely representing the continental lithosphere underlain by weaker fast anomalies extending below 250 km which may represent continental roots 2 weak velocity heterogeneity between 250 and 400 km depths 3 fast anomalies extending horizontally up to 2000 3000 km in the mantle transition zone beneath subduction zones 4 lack of strong long wavelength heterogeneity below 650 km suggesting inhibiting character of the upper mantle lower mantle boundary and 5 slow velocity superplumes beneath the pacific and africa the shear wave radial anisotropy is strongest at 120 km depth in particular beneath the central pacific lateral anisotropic variations appreciably improve the fit to data that are predominantly sensitive to the uppermost and lowermost mantle but not to the waveforms that control the transition zone and midmantle depths tradeoffs between lateral variations in velocity and anisotropy are negligible in the uppermost mantle but noticeable at the bottom of the mantle

failure zone development in andesite as observed from acoustic emission locations and velocity changes three dimensional 3 d locations of acoustic emissions ae and p wave velocity anisotropy were investigated to analyse the failure zone development in two yugawara andesites the results were obtained during the deformation of rock under incremental loading and short duration creep regimes at a confining pressure of 40 mpa creep tests were carried out at a constant differential stress of about 90 95 of short term fracture strength of andesites for the single and two stage creep experiments in both the experiments the ae activity during loading was mostly confined to two region where ae hypocentres concentrated near the cylindrical surface of the rock prior to fault nucleation the localized zone of microcracks attained a spheroidal shape in one sample and planar shape in the other p wave velocity anisotropy increased to 44 as final failure approached in the rock the loading rate and the magnitude of creep stress were found to have a profound influence on the details of failure zone development and times of failure of the rocks studied

long period body wave traveltimes through the crust implication for crustal corrections and seismic tomography summary the traveltimes of p and sh waves through the crust depend strongly on wave period at periods longer than 10 15 s where traveltime measurements for indirect e g surface reflected and core reflected waves are typically made the traveltimes are shorter than predicted by ray theory crustal corrections often used in global mantle tomography to isolate the effects of the crust on teleseismic traveltimes may have a complex frequency dependence and influence finite frequency inversions crustal corrections for profiles of crust2 0 and the prem reference model for the mantle may be several seconds larger or smaller than ray theoretical values depending on crustal thickness crustal velocities and wave period this variability is observed in the difference times between the seismic phases ss and s and between pp and p it is therefore important to incorporate the effects of the crust on traveltimes in finite frequency tomography in order to take full advantage of the variable mantle sensitivity of body waves at different periods

dilatancy brittle strength and anisotropy of foliated rocks experimental deformation and micromechanical modeling 1 triaxial compression experiments were performed on the four mile gneiss the biotite foliation in the four mile gneiss results in dilatancy and strength anisotropies which become more pronounced with increasing confining pressure microstructural observations indicate that when there is high resolved shear stress on the macroscopic foliation dilatancy arises from extensile microcracks nucleated by frictional slip on biotite grains evolution of crack geometry and coalescence are also influenced by the biotite foliation motivated by these observations a damage mechanics model based on sliding wing cracks was adopted to analyze the anisotropic development of dilatancy and brittle fracture frictional coefficients for the sliding cracks are inferred to be comparable to those of cleavage surfaces of biotite the strength anisotropy data of the four mile gneiss can be explained by the variation of the initial damage with the foliation angle the damage derives from a set of preexisting microcracks with random orientation and a set of cleavage cracks in mica grains preferentially oriented along the foliation angle hence the initial damage is higher for the intermediate angles and consequently the strength is somewhat lower the observation that the mechanical strengths of a variety of foliated rocks decrease with increasing mica content can be explained by the same model with the implication that the initial damage and mica content are linearly related the mechanical and microstructural data show that dilatancy anisotropy may significantly influence the progressive development of borehole breakout and strain localization

a three dimensional radially anisotropic model of shear velocity in the whole mantle summary we present a 3 d radially anisotropic s velocity model of the whole mantle saw642an obtained using a large three component surface and body waveform data set and an iterative inversion for structure and source parameters based on non linear asymptotic coupling theory nact the model is parametrized in level 4 spherical splines which have a spacing of 8 the model shows a link between mantle flow and anisotropy in a variety of depth ranges in the uppermost mantle we confirm observations of regions with vsh vsv starting at 80 km under oceanic regions and 200 km under stable continental lithosphere suggesting horizontal flow beneath the lithosphere we also observe a vsv vsh signature at 150 300 km depth beneath major ridge systems with amplitude correlated with spreading rate for fast spreading segments in the transition zone 400 700 km depth regions of subducted slab material are associated with vsv vsh while the ridge signal decreases whilethemid mantlehasloweramplitudeanisotropy vsv in the lowermost 300 km which appears to be a robust conclusion despite an error in our previous paper which has been corrected here the 3 d deviations from this signature are associated with the large scale low velocity superplumes underthecentralpacificandafrica suggestingthatvsh vsv isgeneratedinthepredominant horizontal flow of a mechanical boundary layer with a change in signature related to transition to upwelling at the superplumes

ubiquitous lower mantle anisotropy beneath subduction zones seismic anisotropy provides key information to map the trajectories of mantle flow and understand the evolution of our planet while the presence of anisotropy in the uppermost mantle is well established the existence and nature of anisotropy in the transition zone and uppermost lower mantle are still debated here we use three dimensional global seismic tomography images based on a large dataset that is sensitive to this region to show the ubiquitous presence of anisotropy in the lower mantle beneath subduction zones whereas above the 660 km seismic discontinuity slabs are associated with fast sv anomalies up to about 3 in the lower mantle fast sh anomalies of about 2 persist near slabs down to about 1 000 1 200 km these observations are consistent with 3d numerical models of deformation from subducting slabs and the associated lattice preferred orientation of bridgmanite produced in the dislocation creep regime in areas subjected to high stresses this study provides evidence that dislocation creep may be active in the earth s lower mantle providing new constraints on the debated nature of deformation in this key but inaccessible component of the deep earth lower mantle anisotropy is present beneath all subduction zones indicating that dislocation creep is active in the lower mantle according to analysis of 3d global seismic tomography images

subduction of oceanic asthenosphere evidence from sub slab seismic anisotropy 1 the oceanic asthenosphere is characterized as a low viscosity channel down to 200 300 km depth separating the cold lithosphere from above and it is intimately linked to a layer of low seismic velocity and prominent seismic anisotropy observed globally beneath ocean basins while subduction of tectonic plates in convergent margins is well recognized the fate of oceanic asthenosphere remains enigmatic we demonstrate that subduction of the oceanic asthenosphere characterized by weak azimuthal anisotropy and strong radial anisotropy explains the essence of sub slab shear wave splitting patterns where the fast splitting direction changes from predominantly trench parallel or sub parallel under relatively steep subduction zones to frequently trench normal under shallow subduction zones to explain the observed splitting time the thickness of the subducted asthenosphere is estimated to be 100 50 km

ultrasonic velocities acoustic emission characteristics and crack damage of basalt and granite acoustic emissions ae compressional p shear s wave velocities and volumetric strain of etna basalt and aue granite were measured simultaneously during triaxial compression tests deformation induced ae activity and velocity changes were monitored using twelve p wave sensors and eight orthogonally polarized s wave piezoelectric sensors volumetric strain was measured using two pairs of orthogonal strain gages glued directly to the rock surface p wave velocity in basalt is about 3 km s at atmospheric pressure but increases by 50 when the hydrostatic pressure is increased to 120 mpa in granite samples initial p wave velocity is 5 km s and increases with pressure by 20 the pressure induced changes of elastic wave speed indicate dominantly compliant low aspect ratio pores in both materials in addition etna basalt also contains high aspect ratio voids in triaxial loading stress induced anisotropy of p wave velocities was significantly higher for basalt than for granite with vertical velocity components being faster than horizontal velocities however with increasing axial load horizontal velocities show a small increase for basalt but a significant decrease for granite using first motion polarity we determined ae source types generated during triaxial loading of the samples with increasing differential stress ae activity in granite and basalt increased with a significant contribution of tensile events close to failure the relative contribution of tensile events and horizontal wave velocities decreased significantly a concomitant increase of double couple events indicating shear suggests shear cracks linking previously formed tensile cracks

anisotropy and shear velocity heterogeneities in the upper mantle long period surface waves are used to map lateral heterogeneities of velocity and anisotropy in the upper mantle the dispersion curves are expanded in spherical harmonics up to degree 6 and inverted to find the depth structure the data are corrected for the effect of surface layers and both love and rayleigh waves are used shear wave velocity and shear polarization anisotropy can be resolved down to a depth of about 450 km the shear wave velocity distribution to 200 km depth correlates with surface tectonics except in a few anomalous regions below that depth the correlation vanishes cold subducted material shows up weakly at 350 km as fast s wave anomalies in the transition region a large scale pattern appears with fast mantle in the south atlantic s anisotropy at 200 km can resolve uprising or downwelling currents under some ridges and subduction zones the pacific shows a nw se fabric

waveform tomography reveals channeled flow at the base of the oceanic asthenosphere understanding the relationship between different scales of convection that drive plate motions and hotspot volcanism still eludes geophysicists using full waveform seismic tomography we imaged a pattern of horizontally elongated bands of low shear velocity most prominent between 200 and 350 kilometers depth which extends below the well developed low velocity zone these quasi periodic fingerlike structures of wavelength 2000 kilometers align parallel to the direction of absolute plate motion for thousands of kilometers below 400 kilometers depth velocity structure is organized into fewer undulating but vertically coherent low velocity plumelike features which appear rooted in the lower mantle this suggests the presence of a dynamic interplay between plate driven flow in the low velocity zone and active influx of low rigidity material from deep mantle sources deflected horizontally beneath the moving top boundary layer

implications of crustal property variations for models of tibetan plateau evolution shear coupled teleseismic p waves sampling the interior of the tibetan plateau provide evidence of systematic variations in crustal structure the crust thins by up to 20 km from south to north with a concomitant increase in poisson s ratio from normal values in the south to unusually high values in the north this suggests that the crust of the northern plateau is partially melted due to high temperatures these changes imply spatial and perhaps temporal variations in the way the elevation of the high plateau is created and maintained

quasi static fault growth and cracking in homogeneous brittle rock under triaxial compression using acoustic emission monitoring this paper describes the localization of deformation acceleration in the period prior to dynamic failure in hornblende schist rock under triaxial compression using acoustic emission ae monitoring rather than stabilize the failure process by controlling axial stress to maintain a constant rate of ae for monitoring ae hypocenters as in previous works e g lockner et al 1991 we have instead developed a rapid multichannel data collection system this enables us to elucidate the dynamics of fault nucleation under condition of constant stress creep loading which is a better approximation to low strain rate condition in the earth and allows both quasi static and dynamic crack growth to occur the waveforms of more than 8000 ae events which occurred mainly during a 15 s period were recorded on 32 channels with a sampling rate of 50 ns and mask time of 200 s hypocentral locations of ae sources revealed that the fault initiated at one end of the core and then propagated into the unfaulted rock with a process zone fault front of intense cracking we found that there were two different processes operating during the quasi static nucleation of a shear fault namely a process zone in front of the fault tip and a wake of damage zone following the process zone the process zone had the following features 1 major tensile cracking 2 low b value and fewer larger events and 3 strong self excitation the mechanism of crack interaction and fault growth was therefore a mutual enhancement on dilatation due to tensile cracking on the other hand the damage zone was characterized by 1 major shear cracking 2 low b value and more larger events and 3 weak self excitation indicating that in the damage zone following the development of a shear fault linkage between cracks became the major mechanism of crack interaction and fault development the mutual changes of b value and self exciting strength observed in our experiments seem to occur as a result of the hierarchy of fault growth which was not observed under slowed down loading conditions therefore our experimental results under a realistic approximation of the dynamic condition of the earth are meaningful for the problems of earthquakes as well as rock bursts

mapping the moho with seismic surface waves a review resolution analysis and recommended inversion strategies abstract the strong sensitivity of seismic surface waves to the moho is evident from a mere visual inspection of their dispersion curves or waveforms rayleigh and love waves have been used to study the earth s crust since the early days of modern seismology yet strong trade offs between the moho depth and crustal and mantle structure in surface wave inversions prompted doubts regarding their capacity to resolve the moho here we review surface wave studies of the moho with a focus on early work and then use model space mapping to establish the waves sensitivity to the moho depth and the resolution of their inversion for it if seismic wavespeeds within the crust and upper mantle are known then moho depth variations of a few kilometres produce large 1 perturbations in phase velocities however in inversions of surface wave data with no a priori information wavespeeds not known strong moho depth shear speed trade offs will mask 90 of the moho depth signal with remaining phase velocity perturbations 0 1 only in order to resolve the moho with surface waves alone errors in the data must thus be small up to 0 2 for resolving continental moho with larger errors moho depth resolution is not warranted and depends on error distribution with period an effective strategy for the inversion of surface wave data alone for the moho depth is to first constrain the crustal and upper mantle structure by inversion in a broad period range and then determine the moho depth in inversion in a narrow period range most sensitive to it with the first step results used as reference prior information on crustal and mantle structure reduces the trade offs and thus enables resolving the moho depth with noisier data such information should be used whenever available joint analysis or inversion of surface wave and other data receiver functions topography gravity can reduce uncertainties further and facilitate moho mapping

quantifying seismic anisotropy induced by small scale chemical heterogeneities observations of seismic anisotropy are usually used as a proxy for lattice preferred orientation lpo of anisotropic minerals in the earth s mantle in this way seismic anisotropy observed in tomographic models provides important constraints on the geometry of mantle deformation associated with thermal convection and plate tectonics however in addition to lpo smallscale heterogeneities that cannot be resolved by long period seismic waves may also produce anisotropy the observed i e apparent anisotropy is then a combination of an intrinsic and an extrinsic component assuming the earth s mantle exhibits petrological inhomogeneities at all scales tomographic models built from long period seismic waves may thus display extrinsic anisotropy in this paper we investigate the relation between the amplitude of seismic heterogeneities and the level of induced s wave radial anisotropy as seen by long period seismic waves we generate some simple 1 d and 2 d isotropic models that exhibit a power spectrum of heterogeneities as what is expected for the earth s mantle that is varying as 1 k with k the wavenumber of these heterogeneities the 1 d toymodels correspond to simple layeredmedia in the 2 d case our models depict marble cake patterns in which an anomaly in shear wave velocity has been advected within convective cells the long wavelength equivalents of these models are computed using upscaling relations that link properties of a rapidly varying elastic medium to properties of the effective that is apparent medium as seen by long period waves the resulting homogenized media exhibit extrinsic anisotropy and represent what would be observed in tomography in the 1 d case we analytically show that the level of anisotropy increases with the square of the amplitude of heterogeneities this relation is numerically verified for both 1 d and 2 d media in addition we predict that 10 per cent of chemical heterogeneities in 2 d marble cake models can induce more than 3 9 per cent of extrinsic radial s wave anisotropy we thus predict that a non negligible part of the observed anisotropy in tomographic models may be the result of unmapped small scale heterogeneities in the mantle mainly in the form of fine layering and that caution should be taken when interpreting observed anisotropy in terms of lpo and mantle deformation this effect may be particularly strong in the lithosphere where chemical heterogeneities are assumed to be the strongest the authors 2017

long term dynamics of rockslides and damage propagation inferred from mechanical modeling 1 long term observations of large active rockslides show accelerating deformation over many thousands of years since the last deglaciation the effect of deglaciation on slope stability is however poorly understood due to 1 limited long term observations and 2 a complex interaction between glacier retreat and hydrogeological mechanical and morphological processes to assess the sensitivity of rockslide dynamics to these different processes a model of progressive damage through intact rock mass is developed in this study based on the finite element method this model uses time to failure laws based on rock laboratory creep experiments it is able to reproduce progressive damage localization along shear bands associated with strain rate acceleration as observed during tertiary creep the model reproduces the different phases of deformation associated with morphologies typical of large rockslides this model is thus suitable for simulating the dynamics of large rockslides and the transition from initiation to rapid sliding the sensitivity of rockslide kinematics and morphology to different mechanical properties is analyzed this analysis shows that the time evolution of the rockslide can be inferred with the knowledge of only one time parameter independent of the knowledge of the mechanical properties of the rock mass this parameter is here chosen as the time when the summit slope displacement has reached 10 m a parameter that can be estimated with cosmogenic dating the model is then used to study the effects of deglaciation on the valley flank stability and the formation of large rockslides this study shows that the deglaciation velocity can affect the morphology of the rockslide with the shear band of the rockslide emerging at higher elevation as the velocity decreases we also show that the response to the deglaciation can last several thousands of years after the glacier retreat

normal mode and free air gravity constraints on lateral variations in velocity and density of earth s mantle with the use of a large collection of free oscillation data and additional constraints imposed by the free air gravity anomaly lateral variations in shear velocity compressional velocity and density within the mantle dynamic topography on the free surface and topography on the 660 km discontinuity and the core mantle boundary were determined the velocity models are consistent with existing models based on travel time and waveform inversions in the lowermost mantle near the core mantle boundary denser than average material is found beneath regions of upwellings centered on the pacific ocean and africa that are characterized by slow shear velocities these anomalies suggest the existence of compositional heterogeneity near the core mantle boundary

inferring upper mantle structure by full waveform tomography with the spectral element method summary mapping the elastic and anelastic structure of the earth s mantle is crucial for understanding the temperature composition and dynamics of our planet in the past quarter century global tomography based on ray theory and first order perturbation methods has imaged long wavelength elastic velocity heterogeneities of the earth s mantle however the approximate techniques upon which global tomographers have traditionally relied become inadequate when dealing with crustal structure as well as short wavelength or large amplitude mantle heterogeneity the spectral element method on the other hand permits accurate calculation of wave propagation through highly heterogeneous structures and is computationally economical when coupled with a normal mode solution and applied to a restricted region of the earth such as the upper mantle sem importantly sem allows a dramatic improvement in accounting for the effects of crustal structure here we develop and apply a new hybrid method of tomography which allows us to leverage the accuracy of sem to model fundamental and higher mode long period 60 s waveforms we then present the first global model of upper mantle velocity and radial anisotropy developed using sem our model semum confirms that the long wavelength mantle structure imaged using approximate semi analytic techniques is robust and representative of the earth s true structure furthermore it reveals structures in the upper mantle that were not clearly seen in previous global tomographic models we show that semum favourably compares to and rivals the resolving power of continental scale studies this new hybrid approach to tomography can be applied to a larger and higher frequency data set in order to gain new insights into the structure of the lower mantle and more robustly map seismic structure at the regional and smaller scales

constraints from seismic anisotropy on the nature of the lowermost mantle the d layer lies at the bottom of the earth s rocky mantle and separates it from the liquid metal alloy core this region extending from the core mantle boundary to a few hundred kilometres above fig 1 is geodynamically analogous to the more easily studied lithosphere at the top of the mantle the structure of d may reflect the style of lower mantle convection the nature of core mantle interaction and perhaps even the fate of subducting lithosphere1 observations of lithospheric seismic anisotropy have provided valuable insight into the nature of the upper mantle boundary layer but discussion of lower mantle seismic anisotropy has been somewhat contentious2 5 here we present evidence from seismic waves that have traversed the lowermost mantle beneath the caribbean region for a zone of seismic anisotropy below the d discontinuity which in this region lies 250 km above the core mantle boundary the anisotropy is most probably due to horizontal layering or aligned inclusions of a material with differing shear wave velocity if d is a graveyard for subducted lithosphere a plausible explanation of the anisotropy may be the contrast between cold lithospheric mantle and material that formerly constituted the oceanic crust which may have lower shear wave velocity owing to the presence of melt

microcracking during triaxial deformation of porous rocks monitored by changes in rock physical properties i elastic wave propagation measurements on dry rocks we present results from two series of triaxial deformation experiments performed on dry samples of two sandstones darley dale and gosford carried out at confining pressures from 25 mpa to 200 mpa over this pressure range the mode of failure in both these sandstones passes from localized brittle failure with a clear through going fault to distributed cataclastic flow during these experiments stress strain compressional wave velocity vp and shear wave velocity vs measurements were made simultaneously in the direction of the maximum principal compressive loading axis initial application of the hydrostatic confining pressure causes both vp and vs to increase and upon raising the axial stress above the confining pressure both velocities increase further at first generally by only a few percent but then decrease as dilatant crack growth commences during dilatancy vs decreases proportionately more than vp and this decrease is generally of the order of 10 15 these velocity measurements allow changes in rock physical properties to be calculated along with the axial and transverse crack volume density parameters x and z the results from two selected tests are analysed in detail these tests were chosen because they exhibit a typical brittle shear failure and b typical ductile cataclastic flow respectively the full interrogating elastic waveforms were also recorded during testing and these have been used to calculate the seismic quality factors qp and qs to our knowledge this is the first time this has been reported for rock samples undergoing triaxial deformation the changes in q values generally exhibit similar trends to those observed in the velocity measurements but the percentage changes in q are an order of magnitude greater suggesting that this parameter is a more sensitive measure of dilatant crack damage the measurements on dry rock samples reported here provide the basis for comparison with measurments of changes in complementary physical properties made on water saturated rock samples under the same experimental conditions and reported in a companion paper in this issue read et al 1995

inversion of multimode surface wave data evidence for sub lithospheric anisotropy summary multiparameter inversions of multimode dispersion data are performed for two large regions the pacific ocean and north america anisotropy is taken into account by considering transversely isotropic structures with a vertical axis of symmetry two fundamental questions are studied in detail 1 how to make the inverted models consistent when using different sets of parameters 2 what is the significance of transversely isotropic inversion for the actual earth s structure it is proved that full consistency of the inverted models can be achieved by properly taking into account some a priori informations on the model and it is shown that the use of transversely isotropic models with vertical axis of symmetry does not cause severe limitations when interpreting the data the models we have obtained are discussed in the light of these investigations considering an olivine rich upper mantle we make a tentative interpretation of these models in terms of preferred orientation of the a axis of the crystals in one fixed horizontal direction

fracturing process of granite inferred from measurements of spatial and temporal variations in velocity during triaxial deformations fracturing in fine grained homogeneous granite during triaxial deformation was investigated by measuring the spatial and temporal variations of elastic wave velocities velocities along 20 ray paths were measured with 12 piezoelectric transducers attached to a sample under confining pressures up to 400 mpa systematic velocity differences observed among the 20 paths apparently indicate the formation of a dilatant region near the surface of a sample the damaged region formed near the surface due to asymmetric development of dilatancy seemed to play an important role in controlling ultimate failure no evidence of the formation of a crack concentration zone adjacent to the ultimate fracture plane could be found before failure insofar as could be estimated from the velocity variations of elastic waves propagating along its plane however a highly concentrated region of cracks in which the fracture nucleated was generated in the damaged region at stresses of more than 97 99 of the ultimate strength in all the specimens based on tomographic images computed using an algebraic reconstruction technique the elastic waves were strongly affected by the damaged region even under the high confining pressures at which cracks are considered to close

the anatomy of uppermost mantle shear wave speed anomalies in the western u s from surface wave amplification abstract we build swus amp a three dimensional shear wave speed model of the uppermost mantle of the western u s using rayleigh wave amplification measurements in the period range of 35 125 s from teleseismic earthquakes this represents the first ever attempt to invert for velocity structures using rayleigh wave amplification data alone we use over 350 000 rayleigh wave amplitude measurements which are inverted using a monte carlo technique including uncertainty quantification being a local seismic observable rayleigh wave amplification is little affected by path averaged effects and in principle has stronger depth resolution than classical seismic observables such as surface wave dispersion data swus amp confirms shallow mantle heterogeneities found in previous models in the top 100 km of the mantle we observe low velocity anomalies associated with yellowstone and the basin range province as well as a fast velocity anomaly underneath the colorado plateau where a strong velocity gradient at its edges shows a drastic contrast with its surroundings swus amp also gives additional insights into the current state of the uppermost mantle in the region we image a high velocity anomaly beneath the high topography wyoming province with a maximum depth extent of about 150 170 km which is shallower than in previous tomographic models and resolves previous inconsistencies with geological information beneath the snake river plain a finger like low velocity anomaly dips to the west suggesting lateral flow in the region below about 150 km depth swus amp shows a north south dichotomy in shear wave speed structure with the northern region showing mostly high velocity anomalies whereas the southern region shows low velocity anomalies this is consistent with the continuous subduction history of the western u s and with the recent extension and uplift of the southern region

probability of radial anisotropy in the deep mantle article i nfo it is well established that the earth s uppermost mantle is anisotropic but observations of anisotropy in the deeper mantle have been more ambiguous radial anisotropy the discrepancy between love and rayleigh waves was included in the top 220 km of prem but there is no consensus whether anisotropy is present below that depth fundamental mode surface waves for commonly used periods up to 200 s are sensitive to structure in the first few hundred kilometers and therefore do not provide information on anisotropy below higher mode surface waves however have sensitivities that extend to and below the transition zone and should thus give insight about anisotropy at greater depths but they are very difficult to measure we previously developed a new technique to measure higher mode surface wave phase velocities with consistent uncertainties these data are used here to construct probability density functions of a radially anisotropic earth model down to approximately 1500 km in the uppermost mantle we obtain a high probability of faster horizontally polarized shear wave speed likely to be related to plate motion in the asthenosphere and transition zone however we find a high probability of faster vertically polarized shear wave speed to a depth of 1500 km in the lower mantle we see no significant shear wave anisotropy this is consistent with results from laboratory measurements which show that lower mantle minerals are anisotropic but lpo is unlikely to develop in the pressure temperature conditions present in the mid mantle 2008 elsevier b v all rights reserved

anisotropy of the asthenosphere the higher mode data of the pacific revisited surface wave data previously used by the authors to constrain upper mantle anisotropy in the pacific ocean are re examined after an error was found in the calculations of the love wave phase velocities sub lithospheric anisotropy is still required by the corrected data but it extends to shallower depth than we originally proposed using different parameterizations of the upper mantle we present strong evidence that the bottom of the anisotropic layer has been reached around 250 km in the pacific beneath north america no revision of our data is required and anisotropy could extend to around 400 km depth our results are in agreement with an upper mantle anisotropy due to preferred orientation of olivine crystals in an overall horizontal shear strain parallel to the present day plate motion we suggest that this preferred orientation of the crystals mainly occurs within the upper mantle low velocity layer

non linear crustal corrections in high resolution regional waveform seismic tomography summary we compare 3 d upper mantle anisotropic structures beneath the north american continent obtained using standard and improved crustal corrections in the framework of non linear asymptotic coupling theory nact applied to long period three component fundamental and higher mode surface waveform data our improved approach to correct for crustal structure in high resolution regional waveform tomographic models goes beyond the linear perturbation approximation and is therefore more accurate in accounting for large variations in moho topography within short distances as observed for instance at ocean continent margins this improved methodology decomposes the shallow layer correction into a linear and non linear part and makes use of 1 d sensitivity kernels defined according to local tectonic structure both for the forward computation and for the computation of sensitivity kernels for inversion the comparison of the 3 d upper mantle anisotropic structures derived using the standard and improved crustal correction approaches shows that the model norm is not strongly affected however significant variations are observed in the retrieved 3 d perturbations the largest differences in the velocity models are present below 250 km depth and not in the uppermost mantle as would be expected we suggest that inaccurate crustal corrections preferentially map into the least constrained part of the model and therefore accurate corrections for shallow layer structure are essential to improve our knowledge of parts of the upper mantle where our data have the smallest sensitivity

seismic anisotropy in the core mantle transition zone split s waves observed at hockley texas from events in the tonga fiji region of the southwest pacific show predominantly vertically polarized shear wave sv energy arriving earlier than horizontally polarized sh energy for rays propagating horizontally through d after corrections are made for the effects of upper mantle anisotropy beneath hockley a time lag of 1 5 to 2 0 s remains for the furthest events 93 9 100 6 while the time lags of the nearer observations 90 5 92 9 nearly disappear at closer distances the s waves from these same events do not penetrate as deeply into the lower mantle and are not split these observations suggest that a patch of d beneath the central pacific is anisotropic while the mantle immediately above the patch is isotropic the thickness of the anisotropic zone appears to be of the order of 100 200 km observations of shear wave splitting have previously been made for paths that traverse d under the caribbean and under alaska sh leads sv the reverse of the hockley observations but in these areas the fact that sv leads sh in the hkt data shown here suggests a different sort of anisotropy under the central pacific from that under alaska and the caribbean the case of sh travelling faster than sv is consistent with transverse isotropy with a vertical axis of symmetry vti and does not require variations with azimuth the case of sv leading sh is consistent with transverse isotropy with a horizontal axis of symmetry hti an azimuthally anisotropic medium and with a vti medium formed by a hexagonal crystal given that mg fe sio3 perovskite appears unlikely to form anisotropic fabrics on a large scale the presence of anisotropy may point to chemical heterogeneity in the lowermost mantle possibly due to mantle core interactions

source analysis of acoustic emissions in aue granite cores under symmetric and asymmetric compressive loads the effect of stress anisotropy on the brittle failure of granite is investigated under uniaxial compression non standard asymmetric compression tests are performed on cores of aue granite diameter 52 mm length 100 mm in which 20 per cent of the core top surface remains unloaded the edge of the asymmetric steel loading plate acts as a stress concentrator from where a shear rupture is initiated the propagation of the fracture related process zone from top to bottom of the core is mapped by microcrack induced acoustic emissions compared to standard uniaxial tests with symmetric loading in the asymmetric tests both a greater quantity and more localized distributions of emission event hypocentres are observed the maximum event density doubles for asymmetric 20 events per 10 6 m3 compared to symmetric tests the cluster correlation coefficient a measure of strain localization in the faulting process reaches 0 15 for symmetric and 0 30 for asymmetric tests the clustering of events however is found post failure only three different amplitudes are used to determine b values discussed as a possible failure precursor focal amplitudes determined at a 10 mm source distance and maximum amplitudes measured at eight piezoceramic sensors lead to b values that drop before rock failure first pulse amplitudes automatically picked from emission wavelets show no anomaly first motion polarity statistics of amplitudes indicate that a shear crack type radiation pattern is responsible for 70 per cent of the failure of granite irrespective of stress boundary conditions for type s events with an equal percentage of dilatational and compressional first motions focal mechanisms are determined by fitting measured first pulse amplitudes to an assumed double couple radiation pattern while hypocentres of large type s events align parallel to the later fracture plane their fault plane solutions show no coherent pattern spatial views of fracture planes reconstructed from x ray computed tomograms reveal local small scale changes in fracture plane orientation nodal planes from average fault plane solutions of the microscopic acoustic emission events coincide with the overall orientation of the macroscopic fracture plane azimuth strike angle determined from thin sections and tomograms

deep structure and seismic anisotropy beneath the east pacific rise seismic velocities in the upper mantle beneath mid ocean ridges are known to exhibit anisotropy especially at depths shallower than 200 km in this study we present evidence for deeper anisotropy beneath fast spreading ridges based on simultaneous inversion of body wave travel times waveforms and surface wave phase velocities the dverticalt bsv shear wave speed is systematically faster by more than 2 than the dhorizontalt bsh one at depths of 200 300 km beneath the east pacific rise a result that is consistent with vertical alignment of the fast crystallographic axis of olivine this anomaly is especially coherent beneath the northern east pacific rise where the observations also support the presence of a modest mantle reflector near 260 km depth the anisotropy may be associated with deep vertical flow or finite strain and the presence of this reflector could signal a rheological transition near the bottom of the asthenosphere reflecting changes in flow direction development of partial melt or the persistence of a deep pre existing strain regime d 2005 elsevier b v all rights reserved

seismic anisotropy in the mantle transition zone induced by shear deformation of wadsleyite abstract mantle flow in the earth s mantle transition zone between 410 and 660 km depth plays a key role to understand the nature of mantle convection which can be mapped by observed seismic anisotropy combined with crystallographic preferred orientations of mantle minerals although wadsleyite is the most important mineral to cause seismic anisotropy observed in the mantle transition zone there have been limited experimental data on its crystallographic preferred orientation because of experimental limitations we experimentally evaluated the preferred orientation of wadsleyite developed by shear deformation at pressure temperature conditions of the mantle transition zone 17 6 gpa and 1800 1900 k using a deformation dia apparatus the deformation experiments reveal that the 0 0 1 axis and the 0 1 0 plane of wadsleyite tend to be subparallel to the shear direction and the shear plane during deformation respectively these results demonstrate that polarization seismic anisotropy velocity contrast between horizontally polarized and vertically polarized s waves vsh vsv observed in the mantle transition zone might be attributed to the preferred orientation of wadsleyite caused by horizontal mantle flow

a combined complex electrical impedance and acoustic emission study in limestone samples under uniaxial loading abstract in the present work complex electrical impedance measurements in the frequency range of 10 mhz to 1 mhz were carried out in conjunction with acoustic emission monitoring in limestone samples subjected to linear and stepped like uniaxial loading up to ultimate failure cole cole plots of the complex impedance during the stepped loading of limestone have been used to discriminate the contributions of grains interior grain boundaries and electrode polarization effects to the overall electrical behavior the latter is well described with an equivalent circuit model which comprises components of constant phase elements and resistances in parallel connection electrical conductivity increases upon uniaxial loading giving rise to negative values of effective activation volume this is a strong experimental evidence for the generation of transient electric signals recorded prior to seismic events and may be attributed to charge transfer proton conduction due to cracks generation and propagation as a result of the applied stress the time series of ac conductivity at two distinct frequencies 10 khz 200 khz during linear loading of limestone samples exhibits a strong correlation with the acoustic emission activity obeying the same general self similar law for critical phenomena that has been reported for the energy release before materials fracture

a depositional model for the liassic minette ironstones luxemburg and france in comparison with other phanerozoic oolitic ironstones

joint inversion for global isotropic and radially anisotropic mantle structure including crustal thickness perturbations we present a new global whole mantle model of isotropic and radially anisotropic s velocity structure sglobe rani based on 43 000 000 surface wave and 420 000 body wave travel time measurements which is expanded in spherical harmonic basis functions up to degree 35 we incorporate crustal thickness perturbations as model parameters in the inversions to properly consider crustal effects and suppress the leakage of crustal structure into mantle structure this is possible since we utilize short period group velocity data with a period range down to 16 s which are strongly sensitive to the crust the isotropic s velocity model shares common features with previous global s velocity models and shows excellent consistency with several high resolution upper mantle models our anisotropic model also agrees well with previous regional studies anomalous features in our anisotropic model are faster sv velocity anomalies along subduction zones at transition zone depths and faster sh velocity beneath slabs in the lower mantle the derived crustal thickness perturbations also bring potentially important information about the crustal thickness beneath oceanic crusts which has been difficult to constrain due to poor access compared with continental crusts

savani a variable resolution whole mantle model of anisotropic shear velocity variations based on multiple data sets we present a tomographic model of radially anisotropic shear velocity variations in the earth s mantle based on a new compilation of previously published data sets and a variable block parameterization adapted to local raypath density we employ ray theoretical sensitivity functions to relate surface wave and body wave data with radially anisotropic velocity perturbations our database includes surface wave phase delays from fundamental modes up to the sixth overtone measured at periods between 25 and 350 s as well as cross correlation traveltimes of major body wave phases before inversion we apply crustal corrections using the crustal model crust2 0 and we account for azimuthal anisotropy in the upper mantle using ray theoretical corrections based on a global model of azimuthal anisotropy while being well correlated with earlier models at long spatial wavelength our preferred solution savani additionally delineates a number of previously unidentified structures due to its improved resolution in areas of dense coverage this is because the density of the inverse grid ranges between 1 25 in well sampled and 5 in poorly sampled regions allowing us to resolve regional structure better than it is typically the case in global s wave tomography our model highlights i a distinct ocean continent anisotropic signature in the uppermost mantle ii an oceanic peak in above average 1 which is shallower than in previous models and thus in better agreement with estimates of lithosphere thickness and iii a long wavelength pattern of 1 associated with the large low shear velocity provinces in the lowermost mantle

probability density functions for radial anisotropy implications for the upper 1200 km of the mantle the presence of radial anisotropy in the upper mantle transition zone and top of the lower mantle is investigated by applying a model space search technique to rayleigh and love wave phase velocity models probability density functions are obtained independently for s wave anisotropy p wave anisotropy intermediate parameter r vp vs and density anomalies the likelihoods for p wave and s wave anisotropy beneath continents cannot be explained by a dry olivine rich upper mantle at depths larger than 220 km indeed while shear wave anisotropy tends to disappear below 220 km depth in continental areas p wave anisotropy is still present but its sign changes compared to the uppermost mantle this could be due to an increase with depth of the amount of pyroxene relative to olivine in these regions although the presence of water partial melt or a change in the deformation mechanism cannot be ruled out as yet a similar observation is made for old oceans but not for young ones where vsh s vsv appears likely down to 670 km depth and vph s vpv down to 400 km depth the change of sign in p wave anisotropy seems to be qualitatively correlated with the presence of the lehmann discontinuity generally observed beneath continents and some oceans but not beneath ridges parameter r shows a similar age related depth pattern as shear wave anisotropy in the uppermost mantle and it undergoes the same change of sign as p wave anisotropy at 220 km depth the ratio between dlnvs and dlnvp suggests that a chemical component is needed to explain the anomalies in most places at depths greater than 220 km more tests are needed to infer the robustness of the results for density but they do not affect the results for anisotropy

using probabilistic seismic tomography to test mantle velocity density relationships we use a neighborhood algorithm to explore the fit to long period seismic data of a wide variety of long wavelength mantle models this approach to the global tomographic inverse problem yields probability distributions for seismic velocities density and related properties as functions of depth such distributions can be robust even when individual models are not and allow us to test several assumptions about the earth that have long been enforced a priori in inversions in particular we are able to test the paradigm ofdeep mantle heterogeneity that is dominantly thermal in origin producing velocity and density perturbations that are well correlated and have relative amplitudes given by nlnb nlnvs 6 0 5 our distributions show that such relationships are unlikely and even though the results are consistent with recent best fitting models from damped seismic inversions they demonstrate that many specific properties ofsuch models are not robust the data clearly f density perturbations that are poorly or negatively correlated with velocity heterogeneity and have amplitudes several times larger yielding nlnb nlnvs s 1 0 than damped inversions allow these characteristics are most pronounced in the upper mantle transition zone and the base ofthe lower mantle suggesting layered convection the negative density velocity correlations f at these depths imply dominantly chemical heterogeneity while the likelihood ofrelatively high amplitude density variations suggests that variable iron content is an important component ofthis heterogeneity these results which we show to be consistent with independent gravity constraints represent a profound change in the interpretation of seismic constraints in addition the distributions show that even though best fitting density models from recent inversions or our sampling are consistent with the data most specific properties of such models are not robust this implies that it is more appropriate to use seismic model distributions rather than individual models to make geodynamic and geochemical inferences

seismic anisotropy in the lowermost mantle beneath the pacific onset time differences of up to 3 s are observed between transverse ssh and longitudinal ssv components of broadband s waves at distances of 85 to 120 for paths traversing the lowermost mantle d beneath the pacific after correction for upper mantle anisotropy ssh usually arrives earlier than ssv with the splitting increasing with distance from 100 to 120 the data yield two possible models of anisotropy 1 anisotropy may vary laterally with transverse isotropy existing in higher than average shear velocity regions beneath the northeastern pacific or 2 anisotropy may vary with depth with transverse isotropy concentrated in a thin 100 km thermal boundary layer at the base of d a few recordings at distances less than 105 show that ssv arrives earlier than ssh indicating that general anisotropy likely exists in shallower regions of d

measurements of mantle wave velocities and inversion for lateral heterogeneities and anisotropy 3 inversion lateral heterogeneity in the earth s upper mantle is investigated by inverting dispersion curves of long period surface waves 100 330 s models for seven different tectonic regions are derived by inversion of regionalized great circle phase velocity measurements from our previous studies we also obtain a representation of upper mantle heterogeneities with no a priori regionalization from the inversion of the degree 6 spherical harmonic expansion of phase and group velocities the data are from the observation of about 200 paths for love waves and 250 paths for rayleigh waves for both the regionalized and the spherical harmonic inversions corrections are applied to take into account lateral variations in crustal thickness and other shallow parameters these corrections are found to be important especially at low spherical harmonic order the trench region and fast velocities down to 250 km under shields below 200 km under the oceans both s velocity and s anisotropy support a model of small scale convection in which cold blobs detach from the bottom of the lithosphere when its age is large enough the spherical harmonic models clearly demonstrate a posteriori the relation between surface tectonics and s velocity heterogeneities in the first 250 km all shields are fast most ridges are slow below 300 km a belt of fast mantle follows the pacific subduction zones however at greater depths large scale heterogeneities that seem to bear no relationship to surface tectonics are observed the most prominent feature at 450 km is a fast velocity region under the south atlantic ocean smaller scale heterogeneities that are not related to surface tectonics are also mapped at shallower depths an anomalously slow region centered in the south central pacific is possibly linked to intense hot spot activity a very fast region southeast of south america may be related to subduction of old pacific plate between 200 and 400 km a belt of sv sh anisotropy follows part of the ridge and subduction systems indicating vertical mantle flow in these regions the spherical harmonic results open new horizons for the understanding of convection in the mantle perspectives for the improvement of the models presented are discussed

ellipticity of rayleigh waves in basin and hard rock sites in northern italy we measure ellipticity of teleseismic rayleigh waves at 95 seismic stations in northern italy for wave period between 10 and 110 s using an automatic technique and a large volume of high quality seismic recordings from over 500 global earthquakes that occurred in 2008 2014 northern italy includes a wide range of crustal structures from the wide and deep po plain sedimentary basin to outcropping sedimentary and crystalline rocks in the northern apennines and alps it thus provides an excellent case for studying the influence of shallow earth structure on polarization of surface waves the ellipticity measurements show excellent spatial correlation with geological features in the region such as high ellipticity associated with regions of low seismic velocity in the po plain and low ellipticity values in faster hard rock regions in the alps and apennine mountains moreover the observed ellipticity values also relate to the thickness of the basement as highlighted by observed differences beneath the alps and the apennines comparison between observations and predicted ellipticity from a reference crustal model of the region show substantial fit particularly for t 38 s data discrepancy for shorter wave period suggests that slight modifications of the model are needed and that the ellipticity measurements could help to better constrain the shallow crustal structure of the region predictions for the po plain are larger than the observations by a factor of four or more and transition from retrograde to prograde rayleigh wave motion at the surface for periods of t 10 13 s is predicted for seismic stations in the plain analysis of corresponding real data indicates a possible detection of teleseismic prograde particle motion but the weak teleseismic earthquake signals are mixed with ambient noise signals at the predicted short transition periods detection of the period of polarity inversion from the joint analysis of earthquake and ambient noise ellipticity measurements may provide further stringent constraints on the structure of sedimentary basins

microfracturing damage and failure of brittle granites 1 the evolution of stress induced damage and the eventual brittle failure are experimentally analyzed for mount scott granite of oklahoma we quantify the damage intensity in two methods and directly compare model predictions and actual damage the 14 samples of the medium grain size granite were loaded triaxially at dry conditions room temperature and under 41 mpa confining pressure microfractures were mapped in five samples and the majority of them 80 belong to two groups tensile microfractures trending subparallel to the loading axis and shear microfractures trending 11 40 off the loading axis the tensile microfractures dominate the low stress stage and they remain intragranular with a stress increase the relative density of shear microfractures increases with increasing stresses and they formed elongated intergranular zones of coalescing microfractures we compared two independent values of damage intensity 1 the macroscopic experimentally measured reduction of the deformation modulus and 2 the expected reduction of this modulus calculated with several damage models for the density of the mapped microfractures our fracture density data best fit the model of noninteracting cracks of kachanov 1992

where can seismic anisotropy be detected in the earth s mantle in boundary layers during the last 30 years considerable evidence of seismic anisotropy has accumulated demonstrating that it is present at all scales but not in all depth ranges we detail which conditions are necessary to detect large scale seismic anisotropy firstly minerals must display a strong anisotropy at the microscopic scale and or the medium must be finely layered secondly the relative orientations of symmetry axes in the different crystals must not counteract in destroying the intrinsic anisotropy of each mineral and there must be efficient mechanisms of orientation of minerals and aggregates finally the strain field must be coherent at large scale in order to preserve long wavelength anisotropy part of shallow anisotropy can be related to the past strain field frozen in anisotropy however the deep anisotropy is due to the present strain field all these conditions are fulfilled only in boundary layers of convective mantle we review in this paper the seismic data sets which provide insight into the location at depth of large scale anisotropy from the d layer up to the lithosphere in addition to the well documented seismic anisotropy in the lithosphere and asthenosphere there is new evidence of seismic anisotropy in the upper 400 660 km and lower 660 900 km transition zones and in the d layer nonetheless the bulk of the lower mantle seems close to isotropy if we assume the hypothesis that seismic anisotropy is associated with boundary layers in convective systems these observations strongly suggest that the transition zone is a boundary layer which makes the pasage of matter between the upper and the lower mantle difficult however this general statement does not rule out flow circulation between the upper and lower mantles finally the geophysical mineral physics and geological applications are briefly reviewed an intercomparison between surface wave anisotropy and body wave anisotropy data sets is presented we discuss the scientific potential of seismic anisotropy and how it makes it possible to gain more insight into continental root deformation and geodynamics processes

elastic moduli evolution and accompanying stress changes with increasing crack damage implications for stress changes around fault zones and volcanoes during deformation summary the elastic moduli of rock in areas susceptible to crack damage such as within fault zones or volcanic edifices can be subject to large modifications knowledge of how elastic moduli may vary in such situations is important for both the reliable modelling of volcano deformation and stability and for linear and non linear elastic crack models for earthquake rupture furthermore it has previously been shown that changes in elastic moduli can induce changes in the stress field surrounding faults here we report both uniaxial experimental measurements of changes in elastic moduli during increasing amplitude cyclic stressing experiments on a range of different rock types basalts sandstones and granite and the results of modelled stress modifications the trend in elastic moduli evolution with increasing damage was remarkably similar for each rock type with the exception of essentially crack free intrusive basalt that exhibited very minor changes in general young s modulus decreased by between 11 and 32 per cent and poisson s ratio increased by between 72 and 600 per cent over the total sequence of loading cycles these changes are attributed to an increasing level of anisotropic crack damage within the samples our results also show that acoustic emission ae output during any loading cycle only commenced when new crack damage was generated this corresponded to the level of stress where ae ceased during the unloading portion of the previous cycle using the multilayer elastic model of faulkner et al we demonstrate that the damage induced changes in elastic moduli also result in significant decreases in differential stress increases in mean stress and rotation of the applied greatest principal stress relative to the orientation of the mechanical layering the similar trend in the evolution of the elastic moduli of all the rocks tested suggests that stress modification in the damage zone of faults might take the same form regardless of the lithology through which the fault runs these observations are discussed in terms of their applicability to both fault zones and deformation at volcanoes

radial anisotropy along the tethyan margin summary we estimate radial anisotropy along the tethyan margin by jointly fitting regional s and love waveform trains and fundamental mode love wave group velocities about 3600 wave trains with s and love waves and 5700 love wave group velocity dispersion curves are jointly inverted for sh velocity perturbations from a pre existing 3 d sv velocity model these perturbations are predominantly positive sh faster than sv and consistent with prem but our model also shows significant lateral variation in radial anisotropy that appears to be correlated with tectonic environment sh waves travel faster than sv wave beneath backarc basins oceans and orogenic belts such as the tyrrhenian and pannonian basins the ionian sea the alps the apennines the dinarides and the caucasus the algero provencal basin however is underlain by faster sv velocity faster sv velocity of radial anisotropy is also detected within cratons such as the east european platform and the arabian shield beneath hotspots we detect a change in radial anisotropic polarity with depth which may be caused by transition between the lattice preferred orientation from horizontal deformation in the asthenosphere and the shape preferred orientation from vertically oriented melt channels in the lithosphere we also find significant portion of radial anisotropy within subducting slabs depends on the slab s dip angle

velocity measurements and crack density determination during wet triaxial experiments on oshima and toki granites a set of experiments on four samples of oshima granite at 15 40 and 60 mpa confining pressure have been performed in order to investigate the damage behavior of granite submitted to deviatoric stress in addition an experiment on one sample of toki granite at 40 mpa confining pressure was performed in order to compare and elucidate the structural effects using acoustic emission data strain measurements and elastic wave velocities allow to define consistently a damage domain in the stress space in this domain microcracking develops the microcracking process is in a first stage homogeneous and close to failure localized elastic wave velocities decrease in the damage domain and elastic anisotropy develops using kachanov s model 1993 elastic wave velocities have been inverted to derive the full second order crack density tensor and characterize the fluid saturation state from the fourth order crack density tensor crack density is strongly anisotropic and the total crack density close to failure slightly above one the results indicate that the rock is saturated in agreement with the experimental conditions the model is thus shown to be very appropriate to infer from elastic wave velocities a complete quantitative characterization of the damaged rock

a strong lateral shear velocity gradient and anisotropy heterogeneity in the lowermost mantle beneath the southern pacific 1 velocity heterogeneity and seismic anisotropy in the d region beneath the southern pacific ocean is investigated using broadband shear waves from southwest pacific and south american earthquakes recorded by permanent and temporary stations in antarctica australia south america and on islands in the south pacific shear velocity perturbations vs are inferred from the differential travel times between hand picked horizontally polarized sh direct or diffracted s arrivals and vertically polarized sv sks arrivals derived patterns in vs roughly agree with global shear velocity models but reveal a stronger shear velocity lateral gradient north of approximately 52 s where vs transitions from approximately 0 5 to 1 0 relative to radially averaged reference models over less than 600 km along the base of d waveform analyses provide an even stronger constraint on the transitional region where there is a change in waveform behavior occurring over length scales less than 300 km differential travel times between skks and sks calculated by cross correlating sks with hilbert transformed skks support large vs amplitudes and help to constrain the location of the transitional region anisotropy in d ks is inferred from handpicked differential travel times between the sv and sh components of direct or diffracted s and display a slight spatial trend where the sh component precedes the sv in the north and east of the study area but arrives after sv in the center and southwest of it however there is high ks variability in the center of the study region there is no apparent correlation between vs and ks abrupt changes in the character of velocity and anisotropy in this region of d may be related to chemical heterogeneity at the boundary of the pacific superswell as well as small scale convection in the deep mantle

inferences on flow at the base of earth s mantle based on seismic anisotropy we applied global waveform tomography to model radial anisotropy in the whole mantle we found that in the last few hundred kilometers near the core mantle boundary horizontally polarized s wave velocities vsh are on average faster by 1 than vertically polarized s wave velocities vsv suggesting a large scale predominance of horizontal shear this confirms that the d region at the base of the mantle is also a mechanical boundary layer for mantle convection a notable exception to this average signature can be found at the base of the two broad low velocity regions under the pacific ocean and under africa often referred to as superplumes where the anisotropic pattern indicates the onset of vertical flow

fracture process zone in granite in uniaxial compression tests performed on aue granite cores diameter 50 mm length 100 mm a steel loading plate was used to induce the formation of a discrete shear fracture a zone of distributed microcracks surrounds the tip of the propagating fracture this process zone is imaged by locating acoustic emission events using 12 piezoceramic sensors attached to the samples propagation velocity of the process zone is varied by using the rate of acoustic emissions to control the applied axial force the resulting velocities range from 2 mm s in displacement controlled tests to 2 m s in tests controlled by acoustic emission rate wave velocities and amplitudes are monitored during fault formation p waves transmitted through the approaching process zone show a drop in amplitude of 26 db and ultrasonic velocities are reduced by 10 the width of the process zone is 9 times the grain diameter inferred from acoustic data but is only 2 times the grain size from optical crack inspection the process zone of fast propagating fractures is wider than for slow ones the density of microcracks and acoustic emissions increases approaching the main fracture shear displacement scales linearly with fracture length fault plane solutions from acoustic events show similar orientation of nodal planes on both sides of the shear fracture the ratio of the process zone width to the fault length in aue granite ranges from 0 01 to 0 1 inferred from crack data and acoustic emissions respectively the fracture surface energy is estimated from microstructure analysis to be 2 j a lower bound estimate for the energy dissipated by acoustic events is 0 1 j

brittle ductile transition and associated seismicity experimental and numerical studies and relationship with the b value the acoustic emission ae and the mechanical behavior of granite samples during triaxial compression tests have been analyzed the size of ae events displays power law distributions conforming to the gutenberg richter law observed for earthquakes which is characterized by the b value as the confining pressure increases the macroscopic behavior becomes more ductile for all different stages of the rock mechanical behavior linear nonlinear prepeak nonlinear postpeak shearing there is a systematic decrease of the b value with increasing confining pressure a numerical model based on progressive elastic damage and the finite element method allows simulations of the main experimental observations on ae and of a wide range of macroscopic behaviors from brittleness to ductility the model reproduces a decrease in the b value that appears to be related to the type of macroscopic behavior brittle ductile rather than to the confining pressure both experimental and numerical results suggest a relationship between the b value and the brittle ductile transition moreover these results are consistent with recent earthquake observations and give new insight into the behavior of the earth s crust

hydraulic characteristics of gabion stepped weirs experimental studies on the hydraulics of flow through and over gabion stepped weirs are presented two flow components were observed i e base flow through the void between filled stones and overflow on the gabions the energy loss ratios in the gabion stepped weirs are greater than those in the corresponding horizontal stepped weirs by approximately 7 10 and 14 for weir slopes of 30 45 and 60 respectively as a result the velocity at the outlet is lower stone size and shape have little influence on the energy loss and flow velocity as compared to the increasing effect of the weir slope the pressure acting on the step face for the gabion stepped weirs is less than that of the horizontal steps owing to the cushioning effect generated by filled stones to reduce pressure on a step face at a fixed discharge for different weir slopes the void ratio of the filled stones should be low to allow a small amount of base flow the pressure distribution pattern on the horizontal face of a step is provided

evidence of dilatant and non dilatant damage processes in oolitic iron ore p wave velocity and acoustic emission analyses uniaxial and triaxial compression experiments were performed on oolitic iron ores to investigate damage processes most of these experiments included four indirect measurements of damage evolution that is p wave velocity and maximum amplitude received during pulse transmission experiments elastic properties apparent young s modulus and apparent poisson s ratio and acoustic emission ae monitoring the mechanical behaviour deduced from strain measurements is dilatant for some samples and non dilatant for the other samples however variations in elastic properties indicate damage processes for all samples ae source mechanism analysis shows two different microscopic damage processes 1 for dilatant rock the development of axial extensive microcracks as well as their interaction and coalescence lead to the formation of shear macroscopic discontinuities 2 for non dilatant oolitic iron ore both compressive and shear micromechanisms take place and interact with macroscopic fractures a particular consistency between the four types of measurements employed was observed

nondilatant brittle deformation of serpentinites implications for mohr coulomb theory and the strength of faults we conducted deformation experiments to investigate the strength deformation processes and nature of the brittle ductile transition of lizardite and antigorite serpentinites a transition from localized to distributed deformation occurs as confining pressure increases from 200 to 400 mpa at room temperature deformation in both brittle localized and ductile distributed regimes is accommodated by shear microcracks which form preferentially parallel to the 001 cleavage axial microcracks mode i are infrequently observed volumetric strain measurements demonstrate that brittle deformation is mostly nondilatant consistent with the shear dominated microcracking three observations indicate that deformation in the ductile regime is accommodated by cataclastic flow 1 a lack of evidence for crystal plastic deformation 2 a positive pressure dependence of the maximum differential stress and 3 abundant evidence for brittle microcracking the weakness of serpentinites relative to other brittle rocks is explained by a low fracture strength along the 001 cleavage combined with the low pressure dependence of strength the transition from brittle to ductile deformation occurs at the crossover between the strength of intact serpentinite and the friction law unique to each type of serpentinite rather than the more general byerlee s law if brittle deformation regimes are defined based on the mode of microcracking and on the occurrence of crystal plasticity serpentinites define an end member style of nondilatant brittle deformation this deformation style may result in extremely weak faults in nature and it may also strongly influence the tectonic evolution of the oceanic lithosphere where serpentinite is present

use of s wave anisotropy to quantify the onset of stress induced microfracturing abstractmicrofracturing and induced elastic anisotropy impart changes on body wave velocities with implications to seismic and wellbore testing methods and interpretation we have conducted simultaneous triaxial stress tests and ultrasonic wave propagation monitoring to quantify s wave anisotropy and microfracture development in berea sandstone and silurian dolomite the onset of stress induced microfracturing is detected at the beginning of appreciable s wave anisotropy called the s wave crossover swx the swx and subsequent increases in s wave anisotropy evidence microstructural damage development well before quasistatic indicators such as the volumetric strain point of positive dilatancy ppd and yield failure in all samples x ray microtomography confirmed fracture development and allowed for geometric assessment of fracture orientation stresses at the swx and ppd are compared with peak axial stress to understand linkages between damage and ultimate rock strength in berea sandstone the swx occ

seismic anisotropy beneath the continents probing the depths of geology seismic anisotropy beneath continents is analyzed from shear wave splitting recorded at more than 300 continental seismic stations anisotropy is found to be a ubiquitous property that is due to mantle deformation from past and present orogenic activity the observed coherence with crustal deformation implies that the mantle plays a major if not dominant role in orogenies no evidence is found for a continental asthenospheric decoupling zone suggesting that continents are coupled to general mantle circulation

global radially anisotropic mantle structure from multiple datasets a review current challenges and outlook abstract since the 1960s seismologists have mapped anisotropy in the uppermost mantle the mantle transition zone and the d region when combined with constraints from mineral physics and geodynamics anisotropy provides critical information on the geometry of mantle flow here we review the theory early work recent tomographic models and experimental constraints on radial anisotropy we discuss current challenges in resolving radial anisotropy seismically in particular we show that it is highly beneficial to use multiple datasets in inversions for anisotropy notably short period group velocity data with strong sensitivity to the crust we present a new whole mantle model of radial anisotropy based on surface wave and body wave travel time data along with incorporated moho perturbations our whole mantle model shares common features with previous global models and is consistent with results from several high resolution regional studies

damage and changes in mechanical properties of a gabbro thermally loaded up to 1 000 c thermal loading of rocks at high temperatures induces changes in their mechanical properties in this study a hard gabbro was tested in the laboratory specimens were slowly heated to a maximum temperature of 1 000 c subsequent to the thermal loading specimens were subjected to uniaxial compression a drastic decrease of both unconfined compressive strength and elastic moduli was observed the thermal damage of the rock was also highlighted by measuring elastic wave velocities and by monitoring acoustic emissions during testing the micromechanisms of rock degradation were investigated by analysis of thin sections after each stage of thermal loading it was found that there is a critical temperature above which drastic changes in mechanical properties occur indeed below a temperature of 600 c microcracks start developing due to a difference in the thermal expansion coefficients of the crystals at higher temperatures above 600 c oxidation of fe2 and mg2 as well as bursting of fluid inclusions are the principal causes of damage such mechanical degradation may have dramatic consequences for many geoengineering structures

lowermost mantle anisotropy beneath the pacific imaging the source of the hawaiian plume we utilized recordings of seismic shear phases provided by several north american broadband seismometer arrays to provide unique constraints on shear wave anisotropy beneath the northern and central pacific ocean using a new analysis method that reduces measurement errors and enables the analysis of a larger number of available waveforms we examined relative travel times of teleseismic s and sdiff that sample a large area of lowermost mantle structure the results of this study provide evidence for small scale lateral and depth variations in shear wave anisotropy for a broad region of the lowermost mantle beneath the pacific ocean in particular we image a localized zone of anomalously strong anisotropy whose strength increases toward the top of dq beneath hawaii our results combined with a previous study of vp vsh ratios indicate that ancient subducted slab material may be responsible for observations beneath the northern pacific while lenses or layers of core mantle boundary reaction products or partial melt oriented by horizontal inflow of mantle material to the hawaiian plume source can explain observations beneath the central pacific fl 2001 elsevier science b v all rights reserved

nonlinear crustal corrections for normal mode seismograms we present an efficient and accurate method for calculating local nonlinear crustal effects on the eigenfrequency of free oscillations of the earth we implement the method in the calculation of synthetic normal mode seismograms and demonstrate that neglecting the nonlinear crustal effects in the tomographic waveform inversion leads to velocity models that appreciably overestimate fast velocity anomalies beneath orogenic belts and cratons at 250 400 km depth online material color versions of figures

microcracks in rocks a review abstract in the past decade the number of studies about microcracks in rocks has rapidly increased this review of recent work concentrates on microcracks in rock as separate entities emphasizing microcrack morphogenesis kinematics dynamics population statistics and observational techniques cracks are produced when the local stress exceeds the local strength the local stress may be augmented by twin lamellae interactions kink bands and deformation lamellae stress concentrations at grain boundary contacts and around intracrystalline cavities local strength may be reduced along cleavage planes along grain boundaries and along any internal surface as a result of corrosion by chemically active fluids dislocations appear not to be a significant factor for crack nucleation below about 500 c in silicates spatial and temporal changes in temperature can also induce microcracking as a result of differential thermal expansion between grains with different thermoelastic moduli and thermal conductivities the amount of quartz in the rock has a significant effect on thermally induced microcracks because of its large and variable thermal expansivity the application of hydrostatic pressure between 100 and 200 mpa effectively closes most cracks but the closure may not be uniform if crack wall asperities exist hydrostatic pressure appears to stabilize cracks and make crack growth more difficult the number and average size of mechanically induced microcracks is greater in rock deformed at higher pressures the application of a deviatoric stress field on the boundaries of a rock mass results on a microscopic scale in a very complex stress system which greatly affects nucleation and propagation paths the relative amount of intragranular and intergranular cracking appears to depend upon mineralogy rock type and stress state the vast majority of stress induced microcracks in rocks appear to be extensional statistically they are predominantly oriented within 30 of the macroscopic maximum stress direction crack densities increase as macroscopic deviatoric stress increases above a threshold level crack size distributions may be either lognormal or exponential fracture in rock under compressive boundary loads is a result of the coalescence of many microcracks not the growth of a single crack some crack configurations are more favorable for coalescence than others as deviatoric stress increases and rock failure is approached the microcrack population changes spatially from random to locally intense zones of cracking away from the fault the crack density dies off rapidly to the background level a few grains away under lesser deviatoric stresses slow subcritical microcrack growth can occur as a result of stress aided corrosion at the crack tip the rate governing mechanism may be either the chemical reaction rate or the rate at which water can get to the crack tip important details still remain to be worked out