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Lynch et al. 2003
Lynch, J.C., Bürgmann, R., Richards, M.A. and Ferencz, R.M. (2003). When faults communicate: Viscoelastic coupling and earthquake clustering in a simple two-fault system. Geophysical Research Letters 30: doi: 10.1029/2002GL016765. issn: 0094-8276.

3-D finite element models of a simplified northern and southern San Andreas-type fault system are presented with the goal of better understanding how great earthquakes (M ≥ 7.5) on one major segment of a fault can affect the earthquake cycle on another colinear fault segment separated from the first by an asesimically creeping segment. We find that the earthquake cycles of the two seismogenic fault segments become coupled as the lower crustal viscosity and/or the fault separation distance are decreased. Further, models with a 10%--30% difference in relative fault breaking strengths exhibit a bi-modal distribution of repeat times for each fault, resulting in earthquakes that appear clustered in time.

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Abstract

Keywords
Tectonophysics, Dynamics of lithosphere and mantle--general, Tectonophysics, Rheology--crust and lithosphere, Seismology, Theory and modeling
Journal
Geophysical Research Letters
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Publisher
American Geophysical Union
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