Microearthquake reveals the lithospheric structure at midocean ridges and oceanic transform faults

Mid-ocean ridge and oceanic transforms are among the most prominent features on the seafloor surface and are crucial for understanding seafloor spreading and plate tectonic dynamics,but the deep structure of the oceanic lithosphere remains poorly understood.The large number of microearthquakes occurring along ridges and transforms provide valuable information for gaining an indepth view of the underlying detailed seismic structures,contributing to understanding geodynamic processes within the oceanic lithosphere.Previous studies have indicated that the maximum depth of microseismicity is controlled by the 600-℃isotherm.However,this perspective is being challenged due to increasing observations of deep earthquakes that far exceed this suggested isotherm along mid-ocean ridges and oceanic transform faults.Several mechanisms have been proposed to explain these deep events,and we suggest that local geodynamic processes(e.g.,magma supply,mylonite shear zone,longlived faults,hydrothermal vents,etc.)likely play a more important role than previously thought.

Determination of the local magnitudes of small earthquakes using a dense seismic array in the Changning-Zhaotong Shale Gas Field,Southern Sichuan Basin

With the development of unconventional shale gas in the southern Sichuan Basin,seismicity in the region has increased significantly in recent years.Though the existing sparse regional seismic stations can capture most earthquakes with ML≥2.5,a great number of smaller earthquakes are often omitted due to limited detection capacity.With the advent of portable seismic nodes,many dense arrays for monitoring seismicity in the unconventional oil and gas fields have been deployed,and the magnitudes of those earthquakes are key to understand the local fault reactivation and seismic potentials.However,the current national standard for determining the local magnitudes was not specifically designed for monitoring stations in close proximity,utilizing a calibration function with a minimal resolution of 5 km in the epicentral distance.That is,the current national standard tends to overestimate the local magnitudes for stations within short epicentral distances,and can result in discrepancies for dense arrays.In this study,we propose a new local magnitude formula which corrects the overestimated magnitudes for shorter distances,yielding accurate event magnitudes for small earthquakes in the Changning-Zhaotong shale gas field in the southern Sichuan Basin,monitored by dense seismic arrays in close proximity.The formula is used to determine the local magnitudes of 7,500 events monitored by a two-phased dense array with several hundred 5 Hz 3 C nodes deployed from the end of February 2019 to early May 2019 in the Changning-Zhaotong shale gas field.The magnitude of completeness(MC)using the dense array is-0.1,compared to MC 1.1 by the sparser Chinese Seismic Network(CSN).In addition,using a machine learning detection and picking procedure,we successfully identify and process some 14,000 earthquakes from the continuous waveforms,a ten-fold increase over the catalog recorded by CSN for the same period,and the MC is further reduced to-0.3 from-0.1 compared to the catalog obtained via manual processing using the same dense array.The proposed local magnitude formula can be adopted for calculating accurate local magnitudes of future earthquakes using dense arrays in the shale gas fields of the Sichuan Basin.This will help to better characterize the local seismic risks and potentials.

Large slip rate detected at the seismogenic zone of the 2008 M_W7.9 Wenchuan earthquake

Repeating microearthquakes were identified along the edge of the rupture area of the 2008 MW7.9 Wenchuan earthquake. Slip rates at depths derived from seismic moments and recurrence intervals are found to be systematically larger than those observed at surface. This large deep slip rate may explain the odds about the occurrence of this unanticipated event. Our observations here suggested that seismic hazard could be underestimated if surface measurements alone are employed.