1. Deep structure of the Nojima Fault, southwest Japan, estimated from borehole observations of fault-zone trapped waves
- Author
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Mizuno, Takashi and Nishigami, Kin`ya
- Subjects
- *
FAULT zones , *SURFACE fault ruptures , *GEOLOGIC faults - Abstract
Abstract: To estimate the deep structure of the southern part of the Nojima Fault, southwest Japan without the influence of near-surface structures, we analyzed the Love-wave-type fault-zone trapped waves (LTWs) recorded by a borehole seismometer at 1800m depth. We examined the polarization, dispersion, and dominant frequency of the wavetrain following the direct S-wave in each seismogram to identify the LTW. We selected eight candidates for typical LTWs from 462 records. Because the duration of the LTW increases with hypocentral distance, we infer that the low velocity fault-zone of the Nojima Fault continues towards the seismogenic depth. In addition, since the duration of the LTW increases nonlinearly with hypocentral distance, we infer that the S-wave velocity of the fault-zone increases with depth. The location of events showing the LTW indicates that the fault-zone dips to the southeast at 75° and continues to a depth of approximately 10km. We assumed a uniform low-velocity waveguide to estimate the average structure of the fault-zone. We estimated the average width, S-wave velocity, and Q s of the fault-zone by comparing an analytical solution of the LTW with measured data. The average width, S-wave velocity, and Q s of the fault-zone are 150 to 290m, 2.5 to 3.2km/s, and 40 to 90, respectively. Hence the fault-zone structure with a larger width and smaller velocity reduction than the fault-zone model estimated by previous surface observation is more suitable to represent the average fault-zone structure of the Nojima fault. The present study also indicated that the shallow layers and/or a shallow fault-zone structure drastically changes the characteristics of the LTW recorded at the surface, and therefore cause a discrepancy in the fault-zone model between the borehole observation and surface observation. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]
- Published
- 2006
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