Upgrading Seismicity Monitoring Infrastructure Capacity in the Sea of Marmara

 

Objectives:
The 1999 İzmit earthquake on the North Anatolian Fault (NAF), which is the most active continental strike-slip fault in southeast Europe, produced abundant aftershocks and accelerated seismic activity in the Sea of Marmara. The geometry and character of the main branch of the NAF and its dynamic interaction with other fault systems within the Sea of Marmara, through seismological research need to be established for any realistic assessment of earthquake risk and seismic hazard for the metropolitan areas of İstanbul and other major cities surrounding the Sea of Marmara. The determination of a focused image of seismicity along with well-constrained earthquake source mechanism solutions is an important task for an accurate identification of seismogenic zones of the Sea of Marmara. The existing seismicity images of the Sea of Marmara lack the required spatial and temporal resolution for a reliable definition of seismogenic and aseismic zones. The lack of long-term Ocean Bottom Seismometer (OBS) recordings makes this task even more difficult and challenging when only land based seismological data is available for analysis. The seismogenic zones of the Sea of Marmara are investigated by the analysis of seismicity and source mechanism solutions obtained from the data collected by land and OBS stations operated by the seismic monitoring network of the Earth and Marine Sciences Institute of the Marmara Research Center.  Modern seismological techniques are employed to obtain high precision earthquake locations using joint hypocentral determination, multiplet analysis, and source mechanism solutions using the first motion and waveform inversion tools.

Supported by TÜBİTAK

Duration: 15.05.2006 - 20.04.2009