Synchronization of earthquake cycles of adjacent segments on oceanic
transform faults revealed by numerical simulation in the framework of
rate-and-state friction
Abstract
Synchronization behavior of large earthquakes (rupture of nearby faults
close in time for many cycles) has been reported in many fault systems.
The general idea is that the faults in the system have similar repeating
interval and are positively coupled through stress interaction. However,
many details of such synchronization remain unknown. Here, we built
numerical models in the framework of rate/state friction to simulate
earthquake cycles on the west Gofar fault, East Pacific Rise. Our model
consists of two seismic patches, separated by a barrier patch,
constrained by seismic observations. We varied the parameters in the
barrier to understand its role on earthquake synchronization. First, we
found that static stress transfer can lead to synchronization, opposite
to the suggestion by Scholz (2010). Second, the width of the barrier is
more important than its strength. When the barrier is narrow enough (no
more than half width of the seismic patch in our models), the system can
achieve synchronization even with a very strong barrier. Third, for
certain simulations, the interaction between the two seismic patches
promotes partial rupture in the seismic patches and leads to complex
behavior: the system switches from synchronized to unsynchronized over
10-20 cycles. Moreover, the average seismic ratio of the entire fault
can be quite low, ranging between 0.2-0.4 because of the barrier patch.
We suggest that the existence of large barrier patches contributes
significantly to the well-observed low seismic ratio on oceanic
transform faults.