Transient and stationary behavior of the Olami-Feder-Christensen earthquake model

TL;DR

This paper studies the Olami-Feder-Christensen earthquake model's transient and stationary behaviors through simulations, revealing nonanalytic divergence of transient time at zero coupling and non-power-law avalanche distributions.

Contribution

It provides new insights into the model's dynamics, especially regarding how transient times and avalanche distributions behave with system size and coupling strength.

Findings

Transient time diverges nonanalytically as coupling approaches zero.

Avalanche-size distribution does not tend to a power law with increasing system size.

Stationary state properties depend on coupling parameter and system size.

Abstract

Using long-term computer simulations and mean-field like arguments, we investigate the transient time and the properties of the stationary state of the Olami-Feder-Christensen earthquake model as function of the coupling parameter $\alpha$ and the system size $N$. The most important findings are that the transient time diverges nonanalytically when $\alpha$ approaches zero, and that the avalanche-size distribution will not approach a power law with increasing system size.