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Pisco earthquake 2: Velocity structure and fault geometry files

Diego Melgar edited this page Aug 19, 2015 · 23 revisions

Now that the folder structure has been created we need to setup the relevant files for the inversion. Here we will setup the velocity structure file, which contains information on the 1D layered Earth model assumed in the inversion and the fault geometry files.

Velocity structure

Mudpy uses velocity model files denoted by the extension .mod a file template.mod is copied into the structure folder when you initalize the folder structure so that you may see it's format. You can either edit this file or make your own. The columns are layer thickness in km, vs in km/s, vp in km/s, density in g/cm^3, s-wave quality and, p-wave quality. Make sure you do not leave an empty line at the end of the file, this will produce empty Green's functions.

Now we must decide on a velocity structure for the Pisco region. A quick search of the literature reveals that for northern Chile and southern Peru a good 1D model can be found in Husen et al. (1999) which gives P and S wave velocities, that velocity model does not include density which is necessary for slip inversion. To compute density we use the empirical relation ρ=0.77+0.32*Vp. We also need P and S wave attenuation (Qa and Qb), we use values of 1500 and 600 as recommended in Pritchard et al. (2007). We arrive at the following velocity model:

Thickness (km) Vs (km/s) Vp (km/s) Density (g/cm^3) Qb Qa
3.0 2.990 5.210 2.437 600 1500
2.0 3.090 5.370 2.488 600 1500
2.0 3.190 5.550 2.546 600 1500
2.0 3.290 5.720 2.600 600 1500
2.0 3.390 5.890 2.655 600 1500
4.5 3.440 5.980 2.684 600 1500
5.0 3.750 6.800 2.946 600 1500
5.0 3.880 6.810 2.949 600 1500
5.0 3.940 6.950 2.994 600 1500
5.0 4.050 6.980 3.004 600 1500
5.0 4.110 7.110 3.045 600 1500
5.0 4.180 7.410 3.141 600 1500
5.0 4.300 7.690 3.231 600 1500
10.0 4.390 8.050 3.346 600 1500
10.0 4.730 8.480 3.484 600 1500
0.0 4.780 8.480 3.484 600 1500

I have already created this .mod file it should be in examples/pisco/pisco.mod you need to copy it into home/project_name/structure. Mudpy will look for .mod files in this folder, you cannot put .mod files anywhere else.

Making the fault geometry

There is a function forward.makefault that you can use to make a fault geometry (.fault) file in the format needed by mudpy. We will use the GlobalCMT moment tensor fault geometry and make a fault that has 10x10km subfaults. But first specify where youa re goping to save the fault geometry file:

>>> fout=u'/Users/dmelgar/Slip_inv/Pisco_insar/data/model_info/pisco_10km.fault'

The fault geometry file has to be in this folder mudpy will look for it here. Now make the file by typing

>>> from mudpy import forward
>>> forward.makefault(fout,strike=321,dip=28,nstrike=40,dx_dip=10,dx_strike=10,epicenter=[-76.509,-13.354,39],num_updip=7,num_downdip=4,rise_time=5)

References

Husen, S., Kissling, E., Flueh, E., & Asch, G. (1999). Accurate hypocentre determination in the seismogenic zone of the subducting Nazca Plate in northern Chile using a combined on-/offshore network. Geophysical Journal International, 138(3), 687-701.

Pritchard, M. E., E. O. Norabuena, C. Ji, R. Boroschek, D. Comte, M. Simons, T. Dixon, and P. A. Rosen (2007), Teleseismic, geodetic, and strong motion constraints on slip from recent southern Peru subduction zone earthquakes, J. Geophys. Res., 112, B03307