Abstract
Central Tibet constitutes part of the central part of the Qinghai–Tibetan Plateau, which is one of the highest seismically active areas in China. This paper discusses the regularity of seismic activity in this area. Based on a stratified viscoelastic earth model, we calculated the Coulomb stress changes imparted from four strong earthquakes (M ≥ 6.3) along the Bengco–southeastern piedmont of the Nyainqentanglha mountain fault zone in this region. The result shows that the study area may be entering a new active period from 2020. There was a trigger between the strong earthquakes (M ≥ 6.3) on the Bengco fault zone. The post-seismic viscous relaxation effect of a strong earthquake had a significant impact on subsequent earthquakes (M ≥ 6.3). In the next 100 years, the Coulomb stress loading is more than 1.0 MPa in the northwest section of the Bengco fault and the central part of Nimu segment of the southeastern piedmont of the Nyainqentanglha mountain fault. Thence, strong earthquakes may occur along these fault segments. The maximum magnitude of the earthquake could be M6.7 in the next 100 years.
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Acknowledgements
Figure 1 was plotted using the Generic Mapping Tools (GMT) open-source collection of computer software tools. Prof A Kijko provided great help in the estimation of earthquake hazard parameters from incomplete data files. Thanks to the reviewers for their valuable suggestions. The research reported in this paper was partially supported by the Science for Earthquake Resilience (XH20041), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 51908517).
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Yang, G., Lian, C., Lei, D. et al. Comparative analysis on seismicity and stress triggering of strong earthquakes sequence in Central Tibet. J Earth Syst Sci 131, 195 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12040-022-01936-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12040-022-01936-8