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Experimental evidence for different strain regimes of crack populations in a clay model
Author(s) -
Spyropoulos Chrysanthe,
Griffith William J.,
Scholz Christopher H.,
Shaw Bruce E.
Publication year - 1999
Publication title -
geophysical research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.007
H-Index - 273
eISSN - 1944-8007
pISSN - 0094-8276
DOI - 10.1029/1999gl900175
Subject(s) - strain (injury) , brittleness , exponential function , materials science , power law , strain rate , fault (geology) , population , stress (linguistics) , composite material , geology , seismology , mathematics , statistics , demography , mathematical analysis , medicine , linguistics , philosophy , sociology
We report results from clay extension experiments used as a model for the evolution of fault populations due to stress interactions. At yielding cracks begin to appear and the brittle strain due to them quickly reaches a rate matching the applied stretching rate. The crack density (number of cracks per unit area) initially increases apace, then reaches a maximum at a critical strain, decreasing thereafter. At low strains, where the crack population is dilute, a power law length distribution is observed, which at high strain, gradually transitions to an exponential. This agrees with fault populations data observed in low and high strain settings. These results indicate that fault populations ranging from power law to exponential size‐frequency distributions reflect the population evolution with increased strain.