|Breakdown in Middle Earth Causing Earthquakes|
Mineral reactions in "Middle Earth" are the cause of many earthquakes that have been hitherto unexplained.
Geologists have long puzzled over how earthquakes happen in Earth's tightly squeezed middle layers where pressure is far too great to allow any shifting of the rock? According to research at the University of California at Riverside, breakdown of the mineral serpentine provides enough wiggle room to trigger an earthquake. The report suggests a new mechanism to explain how quakes can occur at such depths.
"This exciting work addresses the central question of how large earthquakes can be generated in deep subduction zones," said Robin Reichlin of the National Science Foundation, which funded the research. "This has been a much-debated topic, and this work goes a long way toward showing that dehydration of minerals plays an important role in this process."
A mechanism called "dehydration embrittlement" breaks down the mineral serpentine, to form the mineral olivine, accompanied by the release of water. That water can assist brittle failure at high pressure, but how? Green explains that before now, scientists have expected faulting instability only if the volume change during serpentine breakdown is positive.
The team conducted experiments between 10,000 and 60,000 times the pressure of the atmosphere at sea level, corresponding to depths in the earth of 30-190 km.
"I am becoming more and more convinced that mineral reactions also are involved in triggering shallow earthquakes such as those that threaten California," Green said. "Our hope is that we learn more about the thing we know least about, the initiation part of these earthquakes, how they get started. This is what we are trying to understand."
Source: National Science Foundation
Finding Fault in California
An Earthquake Tourist's Guide
by Susan Elizabeth Hough
A guidebook to earthquake sites?
Seems unlikely, but it's true. This book helps readers locate active faults in earthquake-prone California and recounts the temblors they have caused.
The guide divides the state into five regions -- Los Angeles, Bay Area, Central, Desert, Owens valley -- and tells where to find faults with histories, descriptions, photos and even GPS coordinates. A sixth chapter covers faults in neighboring states.
From the beginnings of the San Andreas Fault some 25 million years ago to the magnitude 7.2 Hector Mine earthquake of 1999, this book covers the history of California's faults and earthquake activity in a unique field guide format that's enjoyable to read and tourist-friendly.
Author and geophysicist Susan Elizabeth Hough, an informed guide, also penned Earthshaking Science: What We Know and Don't Know about Earthquakes.
Earthquakes in Divers Places
by Ruth Palmer