Constraints on the mantle transition zone structure using triplicated body waves

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Felix Bissig ◽  
Amir Khan ◽  
Domenico Giardini
Keyword(s):  
Transition Zone ◽  
Velocity Structure ◽  
Seismic Velocity ◽  
Body Wave ◽  
Source Parameters ◽  
Body Waves ◽  
Mantle Structure ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Mantle Transition Zone ◽  
Mantle Mineral

<p>The mantle transition zone (MTZ) is bounded by seismic discontinuities at average depths of 410 km and 660 km, which are generally associated with major mantle mineral transformations. A body wave impinging from above on these discontinuities develops a refracted and reflected branch, leading to multiple arrivals of the same wavetype within a short time window. These so-called triplicated body waves are observed at regional epicentral distances (15-30°) and carry information on MTZ structure due to their strong interaction with the 410 km and 660 km discontinuities. Careful data selection and processing as well as the assessment of source parameters are necessary steps in obtaining a high quality triplication data set. In this study, we consider recordings of events in Central America at permanent and transportable USArray stations, which are inverted for mantle structure. Our methodology is based on a joint consideration of mineral physics and seismic data in a probabilistic inversion framework and allows for determination of mantle thermo-chemical and seismic velocity structure. We present constraints on the mantle structure underneath the Gulf of Mexico.</p>

scholarly journals Triplicated P-wave measurements for waveform tomography of the mantle transition zone

Solid Earth ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 339-354 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. C. Stähler ◽  
K. Sigloch ◽  
T. Nissen-Meyer
Keyword(s):  
Transition Zone ◽  
Epicentral Distance ◽  
Body Wave ◽  
Source Parameters ◽  
Body Waves ◽  
P Wave ◽  
Theoretical Modelling ◽  
Finite Frequency ◽  
Mantle Transition Zone ◽  
Band Limited

Abstract. Triplicated body waves sample the mantle transition zone more extensively than any other wave type, and interact strongly with the discontinuities at 410 km and 660 km. Since the seismograms bear a strong imprint of these geodynamically interesting features, it is highly desirable to invert them for structure of the transition zone. This has rarely been attempted, due to a mismatch between the complex and band-limited data and the (ray-theoretical) modelling methods. Here we present a data processing and modelling strategy to harness such broadband seismograms for finite-frequency tomography. We include triplicated P-waves (epicentral distance range between 14 and 30°) across their entire broadband frequency range, for both deep and shallow sources. We show that is it possible to predict the complex sequence of arrivals in these seismograms, but only after a careful effort to estimate source time functions and other source parameters from data, variables that strongly influence the waveforms. Modelled and observed waveforms then yield decent cross-correlation fits, from which we measure finite-frequency traveltime anomalies. We discuss two such data sets, for North America and Europe, and conclude that their signal quality and azimuthal coverage should be adequate for tomographic inversion. In order to compute sensitivity kernels at the pertinent high body wave frequencies, we use fully numerical forward modelling of the seismic wavefield through a spherically symmetric Earth.

scholarly journals Triplicated P-wave measurements for waveform tomography of the mantle transition zone

2012 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 783-821 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. C. Stähler ◽  
K. Sigloch ◽  
T. Nissen-Meyer
Keyword(s):  
Transition Zone ◽  
Epicentral Distance ◽  
Body Wave ◽  
Source Parameters ◽  
Body Waves ◽  
P Wave ◽  
Finite Frequency ◽  
Mantle Transition Zone ◽  
Wave Measurements ◽  
Modeling Strategy

Abstract. Triplicated body waves sample the mantle transition zone more extensively than any other wave type, and interact strongly with the discontinuities at 410 km and 660 km. Since the seismograms bear a strong imprint of these geodynamically interesting features, it is highly desirable to invert them for structure of the transition zone. This has rarely been attemped, due to the mismatch between the complex and bandlimited data and the (ray-theoretical) modeling methods. Here we present a data processing and modeling strategy to harness such broadband seismograms for finite-frequency tomography. We include triplicated P-waves (epicentral distance range between 14 and 30°) across their entire broadband frequency range, for both deep and shallow sources. We show that it is possible to predict the complex sequence of arrivals in these seismograms, but only after a careful effort to estimate source time functions and other source parameters from data, variables that strongly influence the waveforms. Modeled and observed waveforms then yield decent cross-correlation fits, from which we measure finite-frequency traveltime anomalies. We discuss two such data sets, for North America and Europe, and conclude that their signal quality and azimuthal coverage should be adequate for tomographic inversion. In order to compute sensitivity kernels at the pertinent high body-wave frequencies, we use fully numerical forward modelling of the seismic wavefield through a spherically symmetric earth.

scholarly journals Imaging the subsurface using induced seismicity and ambient noise: 3-D tomographic Monte Carlo joint inversion of earthquake body wave traveltimes and surface wave dispersion

2020 ◽  
Vol 222 (3) ◽  
pp. 1639-1655
Author(s):  
Xin Zhang ◽  
Corinna Roy ◽  
Andrew Curtis ◽  
Andy Nowacki ◽  
Brian Baptie
Keyword(s):  
Surface Wave ◽  
Ambient Noise ◽  
Velocity Structure ◽  
Joint Inversion ◽  
Body Wave ◽  
Source Parameters ◽  
Wave Dispersion ◽  
Inversion Method ◽  
Surface Wave Dispersion ◽  
Wave Data

SUMMARY Seismic body wave traveltime tomography and surface wave dispersion tomography have been used widely to characterize earthquakes and to study the subsurface structure of the Earth. Since these types of problem are often significantly non-linear and have non-unique solutions, Markov chain Monte Carlo methods have been used to find probabilistic solutions. Body and surface wave data are usually inverted separately to produce independent velocity models. However, body wave tomography is generally sensitive to structure around the subvolume in which earthquakes occur and produces limited resolution in the shallower Earth, whereas surface wave tomography is often sensitive to shallower structure. To better estimate subsurface properties, we therefore jointly invert for the seismic velocity structure and earthquake locations using body and surface wave data simultaneously. We apply the new joint inversion method to a mining site in the United Kingdom at which induced seismicity occurred and was recorded on a small local network of stations, and where ambient noise recordings are available from the same stations. The ambient noise is processed to obtain inter-receiver surface wave dispersion measurements which are inverted jointly with body wave arrival times from local earthquakes. The results show that by using both types of data, the earthquake source parameters and the velocity structure can be better constrained than in independent inversions. To further understand and interpret the results, we conduct synthetic tests to compare the results from body wave inversion and joint inversion. The results show that trade-offs between source parameters and velocities appear to bias results if only body wave data are used, but this issue is largely resolved by using the joint inversion method. Thus the use of ambient seismic noise and our fully non-linear inversion provides a valuable, improved method to image the subsurface velocity and seismicity.

Detection of repeating earthquakes in the West Bohemia swarm region

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ali Salama ◽  
Tomas Fischer
Keyword(s):  
Fault Zone ◽  
Seismic Velocity ◽  
Background Activity ◽  
Source Parameters ◽  
The West ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Repeating Earthquakes ◽  
Waveform Cross Correlation ◽  
Cross Correlation Analysis ◽  
West Bohemia

<p> </p><p><span><strong> </strong></span></p><p> </p><p><span>Repeating earthquakes, sequences of microseismic events with highly similar seismograms and magnitudes, suggest quasi-periodic rupturing of the same asperity. They are observed on creeping fault segments surrounded by aseismic slip area and also in earthquake swarms. However, so far, they have not been documented in the West Bohemia/Vogtland seismic swarm area. These local swarms consist of thousands of M</span><sub><span>L</span></sub><span> < 4 events occurring along a small area of fault zone with repeated activation of some patches during the swarms and weak background activity in the intermediate periods. Detecting and analyzing the repeating earthquakes would help revealing the continuing background activity and identifying fault areas that are active permanently. This could point to the possible sources of fluids or aseismic creep that are supposed to play significant role in swarm generation. Repeating earthquakes are identified by waveform cross-correlation analysis comparing waveforms of repeaters with continuous seismic data set. We developed efficient detection algorithm to identify repeating earthquakes using selected event templates to reveal continuing seismic activity along the main Nový Kostel fault zone, namely in the areas with only episodic activity. The results provide a robust basis for routine application to the long-term seismic dataset that will allow also for further applications including analysis of the source parameters of the repeaters and/or detecting possible seismic velocity variations in the focal zone. </span></p><p> </p>

Nonlinear traveltime inversion scheme for crosshole seismic tomography in tilted transversely isotropic media

Geophysics ◽  
2008 ◽  
Vol 73 (4) ◽  
pp. D17-D33 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bing Zhou ◽  
Stewart Greenhalgh ◽  
Alan Green
Keyword(s):  
Seismic Tomography ◽  
Velocity Structure ◽  
Body Wave ◽  
Transversely Isotropic ◽  
The Body ◽  
Body Waves ◽  
Inversion Method ◽  
Perturbation Equation ◽  
Transversely Isotropic Media ◽  
Isotropic Media

Crosshole seismic tomography often is applied to image the velocity structure of an interwell medium. If the rocks are anisotropic, the tomographic technique must be adapted to the complex situation; otherwise, it leads to a false interpretation. We propose a nonlinear kinematic inversion method for crosshole seismic tomography in composite transversely isotropic media with known dipping symmetry axes. This method is based on a new version of the first-order traveltime perturbation equation. It directly uses the derivative of the phase velocity rather than the eigenvectors of the body-wave modes to overcome the singularity problem for application to the two quasi-shear waves. We applied an iterative nonlinear solver incorporating our kinematic ray-tracing scheme and directly compute the Jacobian matrix in an arbitrary reference medium. This reconstructs the five elastic moduli or Thomsen parameters from the first-arrival traveltimes of the three seismic body waves (qP, qSV, qSH) in strongly and weakly anisotropic media. We conducted three synthetic experiments that involve determining anisotropic parameters for a homogeneous rock, reconstructing a fault embedded in a strongly anisotropic background, and imaging a complicated four-layer model containing a small channel and a buried dipping interface. We compared results of our nonlinear inversion method with isotropic tomography and the traditional linear anisotropic inversion scheme, which showed the capability and superiority of the new scheme for crosshole tomographic imaging.

scholarly journals A procedure for source studies from spectrums of long-period seismic body waves

1965 ◽  
Vol 55 (2) ◽  
pp. 203-235 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ari Ben-Menahem ◽  
Stewart W. Smith ◽  
Ta-Liang Teng
Keyword(s):  
Body Wave ◽  
Source Parameters ◽  
Wave Theory ◽  
Body Waves ◽  
Spectral Window ◽  
Earthquake Sources ◽  
Source Studies ◽  
New Ideas ◽  
Intermediate Earthquake ◽  
Set Up

Abstract The well-known first motion method of Nakano and Byerly is extended, generalized and combined with recent new ideas in body wave theory in order to set up a routine procedure for extracting source parameters from spectral analysis of isolated P and S pulses recorded at a net of standardized stations around a non-shallow source. The method consists of compensating the observed spectrums for instrumental and propagational effects. A combined study of the resulting radiation patterns, initial phases, and the initial amplitudes will render information regarding the spatial and temporal nature of deep and intermediate earthquake sources as seen through the spectral window of 10-100 seconds. The shorter periods can be used for source studies only if an accurate station correction is available.

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