Friction Laws and Numerical Modeling of the Seismic Cycle

TL;DR

This paper reviews the seismic cycle, focusing on friction laws and mechanical modeling, to enhance understanding of earthquake processes and identify future research directions.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive overview of friction laws and simple analog models for seismic cycle simulation, highlighting open questions in earthquake prediction research.

Findings

Friction laws are fundamental to modeling the seismic cycle.

Simple analog models can simulate earthquake processes.

Open questions remain in predicting specific seismic events.

Abstract

Earthquakes rank among the most destructive manifestations of the Earth's dynamics. Can they be predicted? This is often the first question students ask. To answer that right away: no, at present it is not possible to anticipate the date, site and magnitude of future seismic events. However, there does exist a general framework to describe observations related to earthquakes and understand the processes that lead to their occurrence: the seismic cycle. This chapter introduces the reader to the friction laws from a historical to state of the art perspective. It then deals with mechanical modelling of the seismic cycle through simple analog models and finally presents some open questions and directions for future research.