Earthquake source parameters from GPS-measured static displacements with potential for real-time application

Journal article

We describe a method for determining an optimal centroid-moment tensor solution of an earthquake from a set of static displacements measured using a network of Global Positioning System receivers. Using static displacements observed after the 4 April 2010, MW 7.2 El Mayor-Cucapah, Mexico, earthquake, we perform an iterative inversion to obtain the source mechanism and location, which minimize the least-squares difference between data and synthetics. The efficiency of our algorithm for forward modeling static displacements in a layered elastic medium allows the inversion to be performed in real-time on a single processor without the need for precomputed libraries of excitation kernels; we present simulated real-time results for the El Mayor- Cucapah earthquake. The only a priori information that our inversion scheme needs is a crustal model and approximate source location, so the method proposed here may represent an improvement on existing early warning approaches that rely on foreknowledge of fault locations and geometries. © 2013. American Geophysical Union. All Rights Reserved.

Authors: O'Toole, T; Valentine, A; Woodhouse, J

• Publication status: Published
• Journal: GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS
• Volume: 40
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 60-65
• Publication date: 2013-01-16
• DOI: 10.1029/2012GL054209
• EISSN: 1944-8007
• ISSN: 0094-8276
• Language: English