Abstract
The earth sciences are concerned with extremely diverse sets of strongly interacting phenomena. Very often the development of a better understanding of these phenomena requires an accurate description of complex structures and the way in which they evolve under conditions that may be far from equilibrium. The recent development of fractal geometry (Mandelbrot, 1975, Mandelbrot, 1977, Mandelbrot, 1982) has provided a valuable new approach towards a quantitative description of the statistical properties of a wide variety of structures ranging in size from large molecules to the coastlines of continents. In recent years many simple non-equilibrium growth models have been developed, which very often lead to the formation of complex structures that closely resemble structures formed by natural processes and that can also be described quite well in terms of fractal geometry (Family and Landau, 1984; Stanley and Ostrowsky, 1986; Feder, 1988; Avnir, 1989; Vicsek, 1989; and Pietronero, 1989, for example). In most cases these models are too simple to provide accurate, detailed descriptions of natural phenomena. However, they often seem to capture the most essential features and provide a basis for the development of more complete models that can be used to study specific processes and systems.
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Meakin, P., Fowler, A.D. (1995). Diffusion-limited Aggregation in the Earth Sciences. In: Barton, C.C., La Pointe, P.R. (eds) Fractals in Petroleum Geology and Earth Processes. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4615-1815-0_11
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4615-1815-0_11
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