Publications related to San Andreas Fault

Fault roughness controls injection-induced seismicity

Surface roughness ubiquitously prevails in natural faults across various length scales. Despite extensive studies highlighting the important role of fault geometry in the dynamics of tectonic earthquakes, whether and how fault roughness affects fluid-induc ...

National Academy of Sciences2024

Three-dimensional fluid-driven frictional ruptures: theory and applications

Alexis Alejandro Sáez Uribe

Fluid-driven frictional ruptures are important in a broad range of subsurface engineering technologies and natural earthquake-related phenomena. Some examples of subsurface operations where borehole fluid injections can induce frictional slip are deep geot ...

EPFL2023

Influence of Viscous Lubricant on Nucleation and Propagation of Frictional Ruptures

Marie Estelle Solange Violay, François Xavier Thibault Passelègue, Federica Paglialunga

Fluids are pervasive in the Earth's crust and saturate fractures and faults. The combination of fluids and gouge layers developing along faults can generate fluids of different viscosities. Such viscous fluids were found to influence the reactivation, fric ...

2023

Physical characterization of fault rocks within the Opalinus Clay formation

Marie Estelle Solange Violay, Luis Felipe Orellana Espinoza, Christophe Nussbaum

Near-surface disposal of radioactive waste in shales is a promising option to safeguard the population and environment. However, natural faults intersecting these geological formations can potentially affect the long-term isolation of the repositories. Thi ...

Nature Research2022

On the scale dependence in the dynamics of frictional rupture: Constant fracture energy versus size-dependent breakdown work

Marie Estelle Solange Violay, François Xavier Thibault Passelègue, Mathias Alexandre David Lebihain, Federica Paglialunga, Fabian Barras

Potential energy stored during the inter-seismic period by tectonic loading around faults is released during earthquakes as radiated energy, frictional dissipation and fracture energy. The latter is of first importance since it is expected to control the n ...

2022

The Influence of Loading Path on Fault Reactivation:a Laboratory Perspective

Marie Estelle Solange Violay, Carolina Giorgetti

The loading path the fault experiences is often neglected when evaluating its potential for reactivation and the related seismic risk. However, stress history affects fault zone compaction and dilation, and thus its mechanics. Therefore, in incohesive faul ...

2021

Experimental plastic reactivation of pseudotachylyte‐filled shear zones

Marie Estelle Solange Violay, François Xavier Thibault Passelègue

Pseudotachylytes are fine‐grained fault rocks that solidify from melt that is produced in fault zones during earthquakes. Exposed sections of natural fault zones reveal evidence of post‐seismic plastic deformation (i.e. reactivation) of pseudotachylyte, wh ...

2021

Three-dimensional fluid-driven stable frictional ruptures

Brice Tanguy Alphonse Lecampion, Alexis Alejandro Sáez Uribe

We investigate the quasi-static growth of a fluid-driven frictional shear crack that propagates in mixed mode (II+III) on a planar fault interface that separates two identical half-spaces of a three-dimensional solid. The fault interface is characterized b ...

2022

Bifurcations at the Stability Transition of Earthquake Faulting

Carolina Giorgetti

Tectonic faults typically break in a single rupture mode within the range of styles from slow slip to dynamic earthquake failure. However, in increasingly well-documented instances, the same fault segment fails in both slow and fast modes within a short pe ...

AMER GEOPHYSICAL UNION2020

Electromagnetic Time Reversal Similarity Characteristics and its Application to Locating Faults in Power Networks

Mario Paolone, Farhad Rachidi-Haeri, Zhaoyang Wang, Reza Razzaghi

The existing Electromagnetic Time Reversal (EMTR)-based fault location methods generally leverage the features of the signals simulated in the EMTR reversed-time stage (relative to the direct-time stage wherein a fault occurs and its originated transient s ...

2020

Fault Stability Across the Seismogenic Zone

François Xavier Thibault Passelègue

Across the seismogenic zone, the transition from brittle to plastic deformation corresponds to a semibrittle regime where brittle fracturing and plastic flow coexist at high strength conditions. Thorough experimental investigations on brittle-plastic trans ...

AMER GEOPHYSICAL UNION2020

Stress management in the context of induced seismicity in subsurface reservoirs

Barnaby Padraig Fryer

The stress state of the subsurface has been shown to have an influence on a number of key processes. For example, the criticality of the stress state indicates how large stress changes need to be before a fault begins to slip, the mean effective stress con ...

EPFL2020

Time reversal applied to fault location in power networks: Pilot test results and analyses

Mario Paolone, Zhaoyang Wang, Reza Razzaghi

This paper presents the results of a pilot test performed on a real medium voltage distribution network in Switzerland with the aim of assessing the performance of a fault location system relying on the Electromagnetic Time Reversal (EMTR) method. To the b ...

2020

Deexcitation Characterization for Power Supply Protection in DC Shipboard Power Systems

Drazen Dujic, Seongil Kim

The deexcitation of a synchronous machine has been used for the protection of the power supply based on a diode rectifier in marine dc power distribution networks. The fault current from the generator can be eliminated with the protection method utilizing ...

IEEE2020

Electromagnetic Time Reversal: Theory, Application to Fault Location in Power Networks and Experimental Validation

Zhaoyang Wang

The time-reversal invariance is readily described and universally embodied in most laws of nature, either in a strict or in a soft sense. Based on this underlying physical principle, time-reversal theory has been theoretically and experimentally studied in ...

EPFL2020

From fault creep to slow and fast earthquakes in carbonates

François Xavier Thibault Passelègue

A major part of the seismicity striking the Mediterranean area and other regions worldwide is hosted in carbonate rocks. Recent examples are the destructive earthquakes of L'Aquila (M-w 6.1) in 2009 and Norcia (M-w 6.5) in 2016 in central Italy. Surprising ...

Geological Society of America2019

Seismic response of RC buildings subjected to fling-step in the near-fault region

Pierino Lestuzzi, Amin Karbassi

Fling-step and forward directivity are the major consequences of near-fault ground motions as they can impose unexpected seismic demands on structures located in the vicinity of the fault. The pernicious effect of forward directivity on the seismic behavio ...

2020

Pore space properties in carbonate fault rocks of peninsular Italy

Marie Estelle Solange Violay

The fault cores of extensional faults in Mesozoic limestones and dolostones are examined by mean of combined microstructural, ultrasonic and petrophysical analyses. Grain-supported fault rocks commonly localize in the outer fault cores, whereas matrix-supp ...

2019

Fault reactivation during fluid pressure oscillations: transition from stable to unstable slip

Marie Estelle Solange Violay, François Xavier Thibault Passelègue, Carolina Giorgetti, Corentin Jean-Marie Rémi Noël

High‐pressure fluid injection in deep geo‐reservoirs can induce earthquakes. Recent observations suggest that cyclic injections might trigger less seismicity than monotonic injections. Here, we report triaxial laboratory experiments conducted on faulted qu ...

2019

Frictional and transport properties of faults zones in the Opalinus Clay formation

Luis Felipe Orellana Espinoza

Deep geological repositories in clay formations are a promising option to ensure the long-term isolation of nuclear waste from the population and the environment. In Switzerland, the Opalinus Clay (OPA) formation is a shale whose favorable barrier properti ...

EPFL2018