ALBERT

Description: We present a new 3-D shear-velocity model for the top 30 km of the crust in the wider Vienna Basin region based on surface waves extracted from ambient-noise cross-correlations. We use continuous seismic records of 63 broad-band stations of the AlpArray project to retrieve interstation Green’s functions from ambient-noise cross-correlations in the period range from 5 to 25 s. From these Green’s functions, we measure Rayleigh group traveltimes, utilizing all four components of the cross-correlation tensor, which are associated with Rayleigh waves (ZZ, RR, RZ and ZR), to exploit multiple measurements per station pair. A set of selection criteria is applied to ensure that we use high-quality recordings of fundamental Rayleigh modes. We regionalize the interstation group velocities in a 5 km × 5 km grid with an average path density of ∼20 paths per cell. From the resulting group-velocity maps, we extract local 1-D dispersion curves for each cell and invert all cells independently to retrieve the crustal shear-velocity structure of the study area. The resulting model provides a previously unachieved lateral resolution of seismic velocities in the region of ∼15 km. As major features, we image the Vienna Basin and Little Hungarian Plain as low-velocity anomalies, and the Bohemian Massif with high velocities. The edges of these features are marked with prominent velocity contrasts correlated with faults, such as the Alpine Front and Vienna Basin transfer fault system. The observed structures correlate well with surface geology, gravitational anomalies and the few known crystalline basement depths from boreholes. For depths larger than those reached by boreholes, the new model allows new insight into the complex structure of the Vienna Basin and surrounding areas, including deep low-velocity zones, which we image with previously unachieved detail. This model may be used in the future to interpret the deeper structures and tectonic evolution of the wider Vienna Basin region, evaluate natural resources, model wave propagation and improve earthquake locations, among others.

Description: The ambient seismic field is now routinely used for imaging and monitoring purposes. Most commonly, applications aim at resolving crustal-scale features and utilize ocean-generated surface waves. At smaller scales and at frequencies above the microseismic peaks, local sources of seismic energy, often anthropogenic, are dominant, and understanding of their contributions to the ambient seismic field becomes important to apply ambient noise techniques. This study uses data of an industrial-scale seismic deployment covering ∼500  km2 with 10,532 stations, each equipped with several collocated 10 Hz geophones, to provide unique insight into anthropogenic sources of seismic energy in a suburban-to-rural area. We compute amplitude levels, their distance dependency, power spectral densities, and spectrograms to describe the source characteristics. The sources we observe in great detail include windmills, a railway track and trains, cars, oil pumpjacks, power lines, gas pipelines, and airplanes. These sources exhibit time-dependent behavior that is illustrated strikingly by videos of amplitude levels in certain frequency bands that we provide as supplemental material. The data described in this study are a potential resource for future studies, such as automatic signal classification, as well as underground imaging using microseismic noise or the sources presented here.

Description: We infer seismic azimuthal anisotropy from ambient-noise-derived Rayleigh waves in the wider Vienna Basin region. Cross-correlations of the ambient seismic field are computed for 1953 station pairs and periods from 5 to 25? s to measure the directional dependence of interstation Rayleigh-wave group velocities. We perform the analysis for each period on the whole data set, as well as in overlapping 2°-cells to regionalize the measurements, to study expected effects from isotropic structure, and isotropic–anisotropic trade-offs. To extract azimuthal anisotropy that relates to the anisotropic structure of the Earth, we analyse the group velocity residuals after isotropic inversion. The periods discussed in this study (5–20? s) are sensitive to crustal structure, and they allow us to gain insight into two distinct mechanisms that result in fast orientations. At shallow crustal depths, fast orientations in the Eastern Alps are S/N to SSW/NNE, roughly normal to the Alps. This effect is most likely due to the formation of cracks aligned with the present-day stress-field. At greater depths, fast orientations rotate towards NE, almost parallel to the major fault systems that accommodated the lateral extrusion of blocks in the Miocene. This is coherent with the alignment of crystal grains during crustal deformation occurring along the fault systems and the lateral extrusion of the central part of the Eastern Alps.

Description: We present our results on the fault geometry of the Alland earthquake sequence in eastern Austria (Eastern Alps) and discuss its implications for the regional stress regime and active tectonics. The series contains 71 known events with local magnitudes 0.1 ≤ ML ≤ 4.2 that occurred in between 2016 and 2017. We locate the earthquakes in a regional 3D velocity model to find absolute locations. These locations are then refined by relocating all events relative to each other using a double-difference approach, based on relative travel times measured from waveform cross-correlation and catalogue data. We also invert for the moment tensor of the ML = 4.2 mainshock by fitting synthetic waveforms to the recorded seismo-grams using a combination of the L1- and L2-norms of the waveform differences. Direct comparison of waveforms of the largest events in the sequence suggests that all of them ruptured with very similar mechanisms. We find that the sequence ruptured a reverse fault, that is dipping with ~30° towards ~north-northeast (NNE) at 6–7 km depth. This is supported by both the hypocentres and the mainshock source mechanism. The fault is most likely located in the buried basement of the Bohemian massif, the “Bohemian Spur”. This (reverse) fault has a nearly perpendicular orientation to the normal-fault structures of the Vienna Basin Transfer Fault System further east at a shallower depth, indicating a lateral stress decoupling that can also act as a vertical stress decoupling in some places. In the west, earthquakes (at a larger depth within the upper crust) show compressive stresses, whereas the Vienna Basin to the east shows extensional (normal-faulting) stress. This provides insight into the regional stress field and its spatial variation, and it helps to better understand earthquakes in the area, including the “1590 Ried am Riederberg” earthquake.

Description: SUMMARY To constrain seismic anisotropy under and around the Alps in Europe, we study SKS shear wave splitting from the region densely covered by the AlpArray seismic network. We apply a technique based on measuring the splitting intensity, constraining well both the fast orientation and the splitting delay. Four years of teleseismic earthquake data were processed, from 723 temporary and permanent broad-band stations of the AlpArray deployment including ocean-bottom seismometers, providing a spatial coverage that is unprecedented. The technique is applied automatically (without human intervention), and it thus provides a reproducible image of anisotropic structure in and around the Alpine region. As in earlier studies, we observe a coherent rotation of fast axes in the western part of the Alpine chain, and a region of homogeneous fast orientation in the Central Alps. The spatial variation of splitting delay times is particularly interesting though. On one hand, there is a clear positive correlation with Alpine topography, suggesting that part of the seismic anisotropy (deformation) is caused by the Alpine orogeny. On the other hand, anisotropic strength around the mountain chain shows a distinct contrast between the Western and Eastern Alps. This difference is best explained by the more active mantle flow around the Western Alps. The new observational constraints, especially the splitting delay, provide new information on Alpine geodynamics.

Description: The lithosphere is the outermost solid layer of the Earth and includes the brittle curst and brittle uppermost mantle. It is underlain by the asthenosphere, the weaker and hotter portion of the mantle. The boundary between the brittle lithosphere and the asthenosphere is call the lithosphere-asthenosphere boundary, or LAB. The oceanic lithosphere is created at spreading ridges and cools and thickens with age. Seismologists define the LAB by the presence of a low shear wave velocity zone beneath a high velocity lid. Surface waves from earthquakes occurring in young oceanic lithosphere should sample lithospheric structure when being recorded in the vicinity of a mid-ocean ridge. Here, we study group velocity and dispersion of Rayleigh waves caused by earthquakes occurring at transform faults in the Central Atlantic Ocean. Earthquakes were recorded either by a network of wide-band (up to 60s) ocean-bottom seismometers (OBS) deployed at the Mid-Atlantic Ridge near 15 N or at the Global Seismic Network (GSN) Station ASCN on Ascension Island. Surface waves sampling young Atlantic lithosphere indicate systematic age-dependent changes of group velocities and dispersion of Rayleigh waves. With increasing plate age maximum group velocity increases (as a function of period), indicating cooling and thickening of the lithosphere. Shear wave velocity is derived inverting the observed dispersion of Rayleigh waves. Further, models derived from the OBS records were refined using waveform modelling of vertical component broadband data at periods of 15 to 40 seconds, constraining the velocity structure of the uppermost 100 km and hence in the depth interval of the mantle where lithospheric cooling is most evident. Waveform modelling supports that the thickness of lithosphere increases with age and that velocities in the lithosphere increase, too.

Description: The dense AlpArray network allows studying seismic wave propagation with high spatial resolution. Here we introduce an array approach to measure arrival angles of teleseismic Rayleigh waves. The approach combines the advantages of phase correlation as in the two-station method with array beamforming to obtain the phase-velocity vector. 20 earthquakes from the first two years of the AlpArray project are selected, and spatial patterns of arrival-angle deviations across the AlpArray are shown in maps, depending on period and earthquake location. The cause of these intriguing spatial patterns is discussed. A simple wave-propagation modelling example using an isolated anomaly and a Gaussian beam solution suggests that much of the complexity can be explained as a result of wave interference after passing a structural anomaly along the wave paths. This indicates that arrival-angle information constitutes useful additional information on the Earth structure, beyond what is currently used in inversions.

Description: In this study, we analyzed a large seismological dataset from temporary and permanent networks in the southern and eastern Alps to establish high-precision hypocenters and 1-D VP and VP/VS models. The waveform data of a subset of local earthquakes with magnitudes in the range of 1–4.2 ML were recorded by the dense, temporary SWATH-D network and selected stations of the AlpArray network between September 2017 and the end of 2018. The first arrival times of P and S waves of earthquakes are determined by a semi-automatic procedure. We applied a Markov chain Monte Carlo inversion method to simultaneously calculate robust hypocenters, a 1-D velocity model, and station corrections without prior assumptions, such as initial velocity models or earthquake locations. A further advantage of this method is the derivation of the model parameter uncertainties and noise levels of the data. The precision estimates of the localization procedure is checked by inverting a synthetic travel time dataset from a complex 3-D velocity model and by using the real stations and earthquakes geometry. The location accuracy is further investigated by a quarry blast test. The average uncertainties of the locations of the earthquakes are below 500 m in their epicenter and ∼ 1.7 km in depth. The earthquake distribution reveals seismicity in the upper crust (0–20 km), which is characterized by pronounced clusters along the Alpine frontal thrust, e.g., the Friuli-Venetia (FV) region, the Giudicarie–Lessini (GL) and Schio-Vicenza domains, the Austroalpine nappes, and the Inntal area. Some seismicity also occurs along the Periadriatic Fault. The general pattern of seismicity reflects head-on convergence of the Adriatic indenter with the Alpine orogenic crust. The seismicity in the FV and GL regions is deeper than the modeled frontal thrusts, which we interpret as indication for southward propagation of the southern Alpine deformation front (blind thrusts).

Description: The recent development of ambient noise tomography, in combination with the increasing number of permanent seismic stations and dense networks of temporary stations operated during passive seismic experiments, provides a unique opportunity to build the first high-resolution 3-D shear wave velocity (vS) model of the entire crust of the Bohemian Massif (BM). This paper provides a regional-scale model of velocity distribution in the BM crust. The velocity model with a cell size of 22 km is built using a conventional two-step inversion approach from Rayleigh wave group velocity dispersion curves measured at more than 400 stations. The shear velocities within the upper crust of the BM are ∼0.2 km s−1 higher than those in its surroundings. The highest crustal velocities appear in its southern part, the Moldanubian unit. The Cadomian part of the region has a thinner crust, whereas the crust assembled, or tectonically transformed in the Variscan period, is thicker. The sharp Moho discontinuity preserves traces of its dynamic development expressed in remnants of Variscan subductions imprinted in bands of crustal thickening. A significant feature of the presented model is the velocity-drop interface (VDI) modelled in the lower part of the crust. We explain this feature by the anisotropic fabric of the lower crust, which is characterised as vertical transverse isotropy with the low velocity being the symmetry axis. The VDI is often interrupted around the boundaries of the crustal units, usually above locally increased velocities in the lowermost crust. Due to the north-west–south-east shortening of the crust and the late-Variscan strike-slip movements along the north-east–south-west oriented sutures preserved in the BM lithosphere, the anisotropic fabric of the lower crust was partly or fully erased along the boundaries of original microplates. These weakened zones accompanied by a velocity increase above the Moho (which indicate an emplacement of mantle rocks into the lower crust) can represent channels through which portions of subducted and later molten rocks have percolated upwards providing magma to subsequently form granitoid plutons.