2,111 research outputs found
Correlations and invariance of seismicity under renormalization-group transformations
The effect of transformations analogous to those of the real-space
renormalization group are analyzed for the temporal occurrence of earthquakes.
The distribution of recurrence times turns out to be invariant under such
transformations, for which the role of the correlations between the magnitudes
and the recurrence times are fundamental. A general form for the distribution
is derived imposing only the self-similarity of the process, which also yields
a scaling relation between the Gutenberg-Richter b-value, the exponent
characterizing the correlations, and the recurrence-time exponent. This
approach puts the study of the structure of seismicity in the context of
critical phenomena.Comment: Short paper. I'll be grateful to get some feedbac
Pattern Informatics and its Application for Optimal Forecasting of Large Earthquakes in Japan
Pattern Informatics (PI) technique can be used to detect precursory seismic activation or quiescence and make an earthquake forecast. Here we apply the PI method for optimal forecasting of large earthquakes in Japan, using the data catalogue maintained by the Japan Meteorological Agency. The PI method is tested to forecast large (magnitude m ≥ 5) earthquakes spanning the time period 1995-2004 in the Kobe region. Visual inspection and statistical testing show that the optimized PI method has forecasting skill, relative to the seismic intensity data often used as a standard null hypothesis. Moreover, we find in a retrospective forecast that the 1995 Kobe earthquake (m = 7.2) falls in a seismically anomalous area. Another approach to test the forecasting algorithm is to create a future potential map for large (m ≥ 5) earthquake events. This is illustrated using the Kobe and Tokyo regions for the forecast period 2000-2009. Based on the resulting Kobe map we point out several forecasted areas: The epicentral area of the 1995 Kobe earthquake, the Wakayama area, the Mie area, and the Aichi area. The Tokyo forecast map was created prior to the occurrence of the Oct. 23, 2004 Niigata earthquake (m = 6.8) and the principal aftershocks with 5.0 ≤ m. We find that these events were close to in a forecasted area on the Tokyo map. The PI technique for regional seismicity observation substantiates an example showing considerable promise as an intermediate-term earthquake forecasting in Japa
Using the seismology of non-magnetic chemically peculiar stars as a probe of dynamical processes in stellar interiors
Chemical composition is a good tracer of hydrodynamical processes that occur
in stars as they often lead to mixing and particle transport. By comparing
abundances predicted by models and those observed in stars we can infer some
constraints on those mixing processes. As pulsations in stars are often very
sensitive to chemical composition, we can use asteroseismology to probe the
internal chemical composition of stars where no direct observations are
possible. In this paper I focus on main sequence stars Am, lambda bootis, and
HgMn stars and discuss what we can learn of mixing processes in those stars
from seismology.Comment: 10 pages,6 figures. accepted in Journal of astrophysics and
astronomy. proceedings of aries conferemce on asteroseismology. december 200
Zipf's law in Multifragmentation
We discuss the meaning of Zipf's law in nuclear multifragmentation. We remark
that Zipf's law is a consequence of a power law fragment size distribution with
exponent . We also recall why the presence of such distribution
is not a reliable signal of a liquid-gas phase transition
Scaling in Fracture and Refreezing of Sea Ice
Sea ice breaks up and regenerates rapidly during winter conditions in the
Arctic. Analyzing satellite data from the Kara Sea, we find that the average
ice floe size depends on weather conditions. Nevertheless, the frequency of
floes of size is a power law, , where ,
for less than approximately 100 . This scale-invariant behaviour
suggests a competition between fracture due to strains in the ice field and
refreezing of the fractures. A cellular model for this process gives results
consistent with observations.Comment: Physica A (in press
3-D multiobservable probabilistic inversion for the compositional and thermal structure of the lithosphere and upper mantle: III. Thermochemical tomography in the Western-Central U.S.
Acknowledgments We are indebted to F. Darbyshire and J. von Hunen for useful comments on earlier versions of this work. This manuscript benefited from thorough and constructive reviews by W. Levandowski and an anonymous reviewer. We also thank J. Connolly, M. Sambridge, B. Kennett, S. Lebedev, B. Shan, U. Faul, and M. Qashqai for insightful discussions about, and contributions to, some of the concepts presented in this paper. The work of J.C.A. has been supported by two Australian Research Council Discovery grants (DP120102372 and DP110104145). Seismic data are from the IRIS DMS. D.L.S. acknowledges support from NSF grant EAR-135866. This is contribution 848 from the ARC Centre of Excellence for Core to Crust Fluid Systems (http://www.ccfs.mq.edu.au) and 1106 in the GEMOC Key Centre (http://www.gemoc.mq.edu.au).Peer reviewedPublisher PD
Geodynamo and mantle convection simulations on the Earth Simulator using the Yin-Yang grid
We have developed finite difference codes based on the Yin-Yang grid for the
geodynamo simulation and the mantle convection simulation. The Yin-Yang grid is
a kind of spherical overset grid that is composed of two identical component
grids. The intrinsic simplicity of the mesh configuration of the Yin-Yang grid
enables us to develop highly optimized simulation codes on massively parallel
supercomputers. The Yin-Yang geodynamo code has achieved 15.2 Tflops with 4096
processors on the Earth Simulator. This represents 46% of the theoretical peak
performance. The Yin-Yang mantle code has enabled us to carry out mantle
convection simulations in realistic regimes with a Rayleigh number of
including strongly temperature-dependent viscosity with spatial contrast up to
.Comment: Plenary talk at SciDAC 200
Earthquake networks based on similar activity patterns
Earthquakes are a complex spatiotemporal phenomenon, the underlying mechanism
for which is still not fully understood despite decades of research and
analysis. We propose and develop a network approach to earthquake events. In
this network, a node represents a spatial location while a link between two
nodes represents similar activity patterns in the two different locations. The
strength of a link is proportional to the strength of the cross-correlation in
activities of two nodes joined by the link. We apply our network approach to a
Japanese earthquake catalog spanning the 14-year period 1985-1998. We find
strong links representing large correlations between patterns in locations
separated by more than 1000 km, corroborating prior observations that
earthquake interactions have no characteristic length scale. We find network
characteristics not attributable to chance alone, including a large number of
network links, high node assortativity, and strong stability over time.Comment: 8 pages text, 9 figures. Updated from previous versio
Using earthquake intensities to forecast earthquake occurrence times
International audienceIt is well known that earthquakes do not occur randomly in space and time. Foreshocks, aftershocks, precursory activation, and quiescence are just some of the patterns recognized by seismologists. Using the Pattern Informatics technique along with relative intensity analysis, we create a scoring method based on time dependent relative operating characteristic diagrams and show that the occurrences of large earthquakes in California correlate with time intervals where fluctuations in small earthquakes are suppressed relative to the long term average. We estimate a probability of less than 1% that this coincidence is due to random clustering. Furthermore, we show that the methods used to obtain these results may be applicable to other parts of the world
Acute and chronic post-surgical pain after living liver donation: Incidence and predictors
Despite its prominence as a concern among potential surgical candidates, there is little information in the literature regarding the short- and long-term pain experience after living liver donation. We undertook a prospective study to examine (1) the nature and incidence of acute and chronic pain after living donor hepatectomy and (2) the factors associated with an increased or decreased risk of adverse pain outcomes. Before donation, a comprehensive assessment of potential predictors of acute and chronic pain outcomes was conducted; this included donors’ pain expectations, psychosocial factors, medical histories, and demographic factors. Detailed data regarding pain outcomes were collected postoperatively (days 1 and 2) and again during 6- and 12-month follow-up telephone interviews. Sixty-five adults (32 females and 33 males) scheduled for donor hepatectomy participated. Substantial proportions of the donors reported a moderate-to-severe level of pain intensity (4 on a 0-10 scale) at rest and after movement on day 1 (42% and 74%, respectively) and day 2 (33% and 32%, respectively). Persistent postsurgical pain was reported by 31% of the donors at the 6-month follow-up and by 27% of the donors at the 12-month follow-up. Generally, this pain was mild, and pain-related life interference was minimal. Female sex, a younger age, and several predonation measures of pain-related anxiety were associated with a significantly greater risk of developing persistent postsurgical pain. In conclusion, this study has identified a subset of patients who experience persistent pain after living liver donation. Additional prospective research using larger samples of liver donors is needed to replicate this work, to obtain a more detailed account of the acute and long-term pain experience, and to determine whether targeted interventions can minimize the frequency and severity of chronic pain.Hance A. Clarke is supported by a merit award from the Department of Anesthesia at the University of Toronto and by the Strategic Training for Advanced Genetic Epidemiology program at the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. Joel Katz is supported as a Canadian Institutes of Health Research Canada Research Chair in Health Psychology at York University
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