Detection of Preceding Tremor Patterns in Artificial Earthquakes Identified by Scientists

25th October, 2023

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Contribution by Constantino Panagopulos, University of Texas at Austin.

Researchers from The University of Texas at Austin have made a breakthrough by isolating a sequence of artificial 'foreshock' tremors in a laboratory setting. This discovery gives rise to the possibility that future earthquakes could be predicted based on the chain of smaller tremors that precede them.

This research has been published in Nature Communications journal.

The next phase involves replicating these results in a natural environment. Leading this project will be Chas Bolton, who will start the work this year in Texas. By using the state's seismological network (TexNet), he aims to find similar patterns in the measurements.

'Predicting or forecasting earthquakes needs us to measure, characterize, and understand the happenings right before an earthquake,' said Bolton, who conducted the research while serving as a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Texas Institute for Geophysics (UTIG).

Bolton is presently a research associate at UT Austin's Bureau of Economic Geology, which manages TexNet. UTIG and the bureau are parts of the UT Jackson School of Geosciences.

With irregular earthquake patterns, anticipation of the next seismic event becomes a challenging task. While seismic records show pre-earthquake geological movements and tremors, earthquake faults also produce meaningless rumbles along with significant tremors.

In an attempt to find an earthquake signal, Bolton created his own earthquakes in a laboratory and then analyzed the seismic 'noise' that came before these earthquakes.

Bolton, along with his team, studied earthquake cycles using a small, laboratory-created fault at Penn State. Their experiments revealed a sequence of tremors that increased in strength and frequency as the earthquake came closer. This pattern wasn't found in slower or weaker earthquakes.

According to Bolton, this seismic pattern is quite important, as it connects the tremors with the main shock. It gives scientific soundness to what controls the foreshocks.

'Not only does this provide a physical explanation, but it also gives us a significant pattern that can be replicated in the real world,' he mentioned.

Detecting such patterns in real-world situations will be challenging due to the massive and deep-reaching faults. However, Demian Saffer, co-author and UTIG Director, highlights the importance of equipping faults with seismic monitors to detect minor Earth changes.

'To genuinely detect these precursory phenomena, there's a need for sensors and long-term observatories that monitor these minor geological activities, providing insight into the fault's behavior before an earthquake,' he said.

Now, Bolton is conducting experiments on a larger, 3-foot-long artificial fault at UTIG. This will improve understanding of how these tremor patterns could play out in nature. These experiments will accompany his TexNet research, analyzing tremor sequences in Texas related to earthquakes magnitude 5 and above. He expects results in a year's time.

Journal Information: Nature Communications

Acknowledgements: University of Texas at Austin