Seismic Receiver and Noise

Correlation Based Studies

in Australia
by
Erdin c Saygn
A thesis submitted for the degree of
Doctor of Philosophy
of
The Australian National University.
January 2007
Abstract
This thesis is directed at exploiting information in the coda of seismic phases
and the ambient noise eld to provide new constraints on the structure of
the Australian Continent.
The exploitation of the immediate coda following the onset of P waves
from a distant earthquake using radial receiver functions is now a well es-
tablished method. The 40 sec interval following P contains reverberations
and conversions, by deconvolving the radial component trace with the ver-
tical components, the conversions are emphasized by canceling the part of
the response that are common to both components. A member of dierent
styles of such deconvolution, are investigated and a variant of the multita-
per method is adopted for subsequent applications. The tasmal experiment
2003-2005 spans the expected location of the transition between Precam-
brian and Phanerozoic Australia. The 20 portable broadband stations were
exploited in receiver function studies to extract S wave crustal structure
through the inversion of stacked receiver functions using the Neighbourhood
Algorithm. There is no clear crustal transition associated with the presence
of Tasman Line. The Precambrian Cratons tend to exhibit crustal thick-
nesses close to 40 km but such values are also found in some Phanerozoic
sites.
The second part of the thesis is directed at the exploitation of ambient
noise or seismic coda to gain information on the Greens function between
seismic stations. The tasmal experiment covered a signicant fraction of
the Australian continent with a simultaneous deployment of portable broad-
band stations. From these continuous records, it has proved possible to
extract very clear Rayleigh wave signals for station separations up to 2000
km, and to demonstrate the frequency dependent variations in group velocity
behaviour. The combination of the paths between the 20 stations localize
such behaviour, but detailed images needed more data. The entire archive of
portable broadband data recorded by rses was mined, and combined with
data from permanent stations to provide more than 1100 estimates of in-
ii
Abstract
terstation Greens functions within Australia. Group velocity analysis as
function of frequency was followed by nonlinear tomography with the Fast
Marching Method. The resulting images of group velocity patterns as a func-
tion frequency show pronounced regions of lowered group velocities, most of
which match regions of thick sediment. The frequency dependence is not con-
sistent with just sedimentary structure and low midcrustal velocities, most
likely due to elevated temperatures, are also needed.
The surface wave portion of the interstation Greens function is the most
energetic, and is normally all that seen in ambient noise studies. However,
in the coda of events record at the broadband Warramunga seismic array in
the Northern Territory, the P and S body wave components also emerge.
The characteristics of these arrivals match those observed from nearby small
earthquakes. The stacked cross-correlation is the normal approach to enhance
Greens function information from ambient noise, but a broader spectral band
width with the same phase response can be found by spectral division. It
appears advantageous to compare both approaches and select the best result,
since very little modications to procedures are needed.
The properties of the ambient noise at a single station have been inves-
tigated in the logarithmic spectral domain and a station dependent signal
can be extracted by stacking. The signal appears to be related to the local
structure beneath the station, and when fully characterized may provide a
new means of investigating structure.
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Table of Contents
Abstract . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ii
Table of Contents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . iv
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii
1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.1 The tasmal Project . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.2 Organization of Thesis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
2 Tectonic Setting of Australia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
2.1 Archaean Cratons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
2.1.1 West Australia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
2.1.2 South Australia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
2.2 Proterozoic Provinces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
2.2.1 West Australia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
2.2.2 North Australia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
2.2.3 South Australia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
2.2.4 Central Australia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
2.3 Palaeozoic Provinces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
2.3.1 Tasman Line . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
2.3.2 East Australia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
2.4 Previous Seismic Studies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
3 Receiver Function Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
3.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Near Source Eects-N
S
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
Propagation Path Eects-P . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
Near Receiver Eects-N
R
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Combination of Eects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
3.2 Method Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
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Table of Contents
Spectral Division . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Homomorphic Deconvolution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Multitaper Estimation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Wavevector Approach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
3.2.1 Appraisal of Dierent Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
3.3 Geophysical Inversion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
Neigbourhood Algorithm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
3.4 Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
3.5 Results of Inversion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
3.6 Crustal Depth Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
3.7 Discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72
4 Ambient Noise Cross-Correlations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
4.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
4.2 Theoretical Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
4.2.1 Representation Theorem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
4.2.2 Bettis Theorem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
4.2.3 Greens Function . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
4.2.4 Seismic Reciprocity in Space and Time . . . . . . . . . 78
4.3 Greens Function Retrieval for Excitation Field Near Station . 80
4.4 Greens Function Retrieval with Cross-Correlation of Distributed
Noise Waveelds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
4.5 Calculation Scheme . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
4.6 Group Velocity Extraction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
4.6.1 Dispersion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
4.6.2 Measurement of Group Velocity . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
4.7 Nonlinear Traveltime Tomography of the Noise Field . . . . . 94
4.7.1 Seismic Tomography Fundamentals . . . . . . . . . . . 94
4.7.2 Tomographic inversion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
4.7.3 The Fast Marching Method . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
4.7.4 Subspace Inversion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
4.8 Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100
4.8.1 Extraction of Greens Functions for tasmal Experiment101
4.8.2 Extraction of Greens Functions for the Australian Con-
tinent . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
4.8.3 Resolution Tests . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
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Table of Contents
4.8.4 Tomographic Inversion Parameters and Models . . . . 113
4.9 Discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
5 Coda Waveform Correlations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
5.1 Cross-Correlation of Seismic Coda . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
5.1.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
5.1.2 Coda Waves from Distant Earthquakes at the Warra-
munga Array . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128
6 Method Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
6.1 Transfer Function Approach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
6.1.1 Application to tasmal Array . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
6.2 Cepstral Averaging of Ambient Seismic Noise . . . . . . . . . 147
6.2.1 Cepstrum Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
6.2.2 Log Spectral Averaging . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154
6.2.3 Interpretation of Local Responses . . . . . . . . . . . . 158
7 Conclusions and Further Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160
7.0.4 Conclusions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160
7.0.5 Further Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164
vi
Acknowledgments
The work in this thesis has been an inspiring, often exciting, sometimes
challenging, but always interesting experience. I would like to express my
gratitude to my supervisors Brian L.N. Kennett and Anya M. Reading for
their continuous support, advice, encouragement and patience during this
three and half years.
I am also indebted to my advisors, Nick Rawlinson and Malcolm Sam-
bridge for their eorts to answer my questions on various parts of seismology.
Without Armando Arcidiacos help on the data retrieval of various ex-
periments, this study could not extend to this level.
I would like to thank for the comments of Brian L.N. Kennett and Anya
M. Reading on chapters 2 and 4.
The tomographic inversion software used in producing the images pre-
sented in chapter 4, has been modied from its original form by Nick Rawl-
inson. The maps presented in this study were created with Rich Pawlowiczs
m map package.
I would like to thank for all the members of my family, especially my
mum for coming all the way to support me on the last 3 months of my PhD
studies. And friends, Ali Haydar, Beg um, Elif, Levent and Soner whom did
not leave me alone by using various means of communications. Also I would
like to thank Haluk and Ylmaz for providing me delicious Turkish food with
their friendship in Canberra.
Finally, I would also like to thank my former supervisor, Prof. Tuncay
Taymaz for his encouragment and eorts on this PhD study.
I have been nancially supported by International Postgraduate Research
Scholarship at RSES, ANU.
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