Earthquake physics

The statistical properties of earthquakes verify several laws, such as Gutenberg-Richter's law, which describes the distribution of energy released by an earthquake, and Omori's law, which governs the number of aftershocks following a major earthquake. These distribution laws have fairly simple expressions (they are power laws), whose precise characteristics are obtained empirically by studying earthquake catalogs.
Together with colleagues in geophysics, physics, and mathematics, (see here) we are trying to understand the origin of these properties. The idea is to apply methods from nonlinear physics, signal processing, and statistical physics.
Our results establish a connection between properties of statistical physics (random walks, percolation, random surfaces) and observations of natural data. See here

EQf1 — Left: We observed in several models that the stress is a function of space that varies over many spatial scales, such as a fractional gaussian field as displayed here. Right: in a numerical model of earthquakes, stress as a function of space. Note that is also displays variations over many scales. The self-affine property of this field is responsible for the behavior of the earthquake (that satisfy the Gutenberg–Richter law as well as the existence of aftershocks).

Selected publications :

Random interfaces generated by the addition of structures of variable size
N. Pétrélis, F. Pétrélis,
Physical Review E 110, 064804 (2024)

Stress spatial distributions, the Gutenberg–Richter and Omori–Utsu laws
F. Pétrélis, K. Chanard, A. Schubnel, T. Hatano,
Journal of Statistical Mechanics, 043404 (2024)

Earthquake magnitude distribution and aftershocks: A statistical geometry explanation
F. Pétrélis, K. Chanard, A. Schubnel, T. Hatano,
Physical Review E 107, 034132 (2023)

Tidal and seasonal sensitivity of earthquakes :

Susceptibility of microseismic triggering to small sinusoidal stress perturbations at the laboratory scale
M. Colledge, J. Aubry, K. Chanard, F. Pétrélis, C. Duverger, L. Bollinger, A. Schubnel,
Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth, 128, e2022JB025583 (2023)

Earthquake sensitivity to tides and seasons : theoretical studies
F. Pétrélis, K. Chanard, A.Schubnel, T. Hatano,
Journal of Statistical Mechanics, 023404 (2021)

Sensitivity of Acoustic Emission Triggering to Small Pore Pressure Cycling Perturbations During Brittle Creep
K. Chanard, A. Nicolas, T. Hatano, F. Pétrélis, S. Latour, S. Vinciguera, A. Schubnel,
Geophysical Research Letters (46), 7414-7423 (2019)