GD
Geodynamics

Earthquake

Modeling the full spectrum of observed seismicity: Insights from friction laws, fault instability, and fault-zone mechanics

and June 17, 2026
Modeling the full spectrum of observed seismicity: Insights from friction laws, fault instability, and fault-zone mechanics

Introduction Despite advances in our understanding of rock mechanics, the frictional behavior of rocks, and the physics of instability in geological materials, the coexistence of slow and fast earthquakes, as well as various types of fault-zone seismic radiation such as tremor, remains enigmatic. Can fault mechanics and friction laws reproduce the full spectrum of observed seismicity? In this week ...[Read More]

Don’t Stop Me Now: A Fracture Mechanics Perspective on Earthquake Nucleation

July 9, 2025
Schematic for a possible earthquake nucleation scenario. Inset figure adapted after Lebihain et al. (2021) and McLaskey (2019).

How do earthquakes start? Earthquakes occur when a block of rock rapidly slides past another along an interface or a discontinuity in the medium and release energy in the form of seismic waves. Turns out, the surface of the earth is riddled with a lot of these discontinuities, which we call “faults”. If we plot the locations of earthquakes on a world map (Figure 1a), we will see that they highligh ...[Read More]

Advanced geodynamic models of giant earthquakes

and September 16, 2020
Advanced geodynamic models of giant earthquakes

Though giant earthquakes are disastrous, they provide essential information to investigate earthquake physics. In this week’s news and views, Thyagarajulu Gollapalli, a PhD student jointly from the Monash University and the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, discusses our present understanding of such big earthquakes and how advanced numerical models will help to get a more precise picture of ...[Read More]

Understanding intraplate earthquakes

July 8, 2020
Understanding intraplate earthquakes

  One of the basic tenets of plate tectonics states that deformation occurs along plate boundaries while plate interiors remain almost undeformed. Intraplate earthquakes  defy this principle and hence are quite enigmatic.  In this week’s News and Views, Prof. Attreyee Ghosh from the Centre for Earth Sciences, Indian Institute of Science, tries to explain the reasons behind intraplate ea ...[Read More]

The Sassy Scientist – Climate Change Causality

February 21, 2020
The Sassy Scientist – Climate Change Causality

Tom Doehne has been watching the news reports on the effects of climate change on human civilization. Dumbfounded that the main stream has not peered beyond the variable intensity of weather patterns and the mere notion of rising sea levels, he pondered: Will the increase in ocean level trigger more slippage along subduction zones? Dear Tom, In terms of geophysical research angles this really is a ...[Read More]

Enigmas at depth

November 13, 2019
Enigmas at depth

The Geodynamics 101 series serves to showcase the diversity of research topics and/or methods in the geodynamics community in an understandable manner. In this week’s Geodynamics 101 post, Marcel Thielmann, Senior Researcher at the University of Bayreuth, discusses the possible mechanisms behind the ductile deformation at great depths that causes deep earthquakes.  Earthquakes are one of the expre ...[Read More]

The Sassy Scientist – Earthquake Exoteries Nr. IV

October 11, 2019
The Sassy Scientist – Earthquake Exoteries Nr. IV

Every week, The Sassy Scientist answers a question on geodynamics, related topics, academic life, the universe or anything in between with a healthy dose of sarcasm. Do you have a question for The Sassy Scientist? Submit your question here or leave a comment below. In a comment on a post about the key papers in geodynamics, the Curmudgeonly Commenter asked: Could you please point out some exceptio ...[Read More]

The Sassy Scientist – Earthquake Exoteries Nr. II

September 27, 2019
The Sassy Scientist – Earthquake Exoteries Nr. II

Every week, The Sassy Scientist answers a question on geodynamics, related topics, academic life, the universe or anything in between with a healthy dose of sarcasm. Do you have a question for The Sassy Scientist? Submit your question here or leave a comment below. In a comment on a post about the key papers in geodynamics, the Curmudgeonly Commenter asked: Could you please point out some exceptio ...[Read More]