A weak subducting slab at intermediate depths below northeast Japan.
Sci Adv
; 10(9): eadh2106, 2024 Mar.
Article
en En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-38427728
ABSTRACT
Knowledge of the state of stress in subducting slabs is essential for understanding their mechanical behavior and the physical processes that generate earthquakes. Here, we develop a framework which uses a high-resolution focal mechanism catalog to determine the change in the position of the neutral plane before and after the M9 Tohoku-oki earthquake to determine that the deviatoric stress within the slab at intermediate depths must be very low (â¼1 MPa). We show that by combining the static stress calculated from coseismic slip distributions with the stress orientations before and after the mainshock, we can determine the full deviatoric stress tensor within the subducting slab at intermediate depths. These results preclude earthquake source mechanisms that require large background driving stresses, favoring a mechanically weak subducting slab, thus providing quantitative constraints on the physical processes that generate intermediate-depth earthquakes.
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1
Colección:
01-internacional
Base de datos:
MEDLINE
Idioma:
En
Revista:
Sci Adv
Año:
2024
Tipo del documento:
Article
País de afiliación:
Estados Unidos