Universal nucleation length for slip-weakening rupture instability under nonuniform fault loading

Universal Nucleation Length for Slip-Weakening Rupture Instability under Non-Uniform Fault Loading

We consider the nucleation of instability on a slip-weakening fault subjected to a heterogeneous, locally peaked “loading” stress. That stress is assumed to gradually increase due to tectonic loading but to retain its peaked character. The case of a linear stress versus slip law is considered in the framework of two-dimensional quasi-static elasticity for a planar fault. Slip initiates when the...

Nucleation of slip-weakening rupture instability in landslides by localized increase of pore pressure

We model landslide initiation as slip surface growth driven by local elevated pore pressure, with particular reference to submarine slides. Assuming an elastic medium and friction that weakens with slip, solutions exist in which the slip surface may dynamically grow, without further pore pressure increases, at a rate of the order of the sediment shear wave speed, a situation comparable to earth...

Nucleation of rupture under slip dependent friction law: Simple models of fault zone

[1] The initiation of frictional instability is investigated for simple models of fault zone using a linearized perturbation analysis. The fault interface is assumed to obey a linear slipweakening law. The fault is initially prestressed uniformly at the sliding threshold. In the case of antiplane shear between two homogeneous linearly elastic media, space-time and spectral solutions are obtaine...

Slip-weakening distance estimated at near-fault stations

Foreshocks during the nucleation of stick-slip instability

[1] We report on laboratory experiments which investigate interactions between aseismic slip, stress changes, and seismicity on a critically stressed fault during the nucleation of stick-slip instability. We monitor quasi-static and dynamic changes in local shear stress and fault slip with arrays of gages deployed along a simulated strike-slip fault (2m long and 0.4m deep) in a saw cut sample o...