Earth and Planetary Sciences 166
    Introduction to Seismology

  • 1. Overview of the course; the role of seismology in Earth sciences.
  • 2. Tensors; principal coordinate system; solution of the eigenvector - eigenvalue problem.
  • 3. Stress and strain; symmetry properties, equation of motion
  • 4. Elasticity; anisotropy, axes and planes of symmetry; reducing the number of elastic constants.
  • 5. The wave equation. Compressional and shear waves; the Helmholtz potential; plane waves in homogeneous medium
  • 6. Elements of time series analysis, I: The Fourier transform, Fourier series
  • 7. Elements of time series analysis, II: Filtration, the convolution integral, cross- correlation and auto-correlation,.
  • 8. Seismic instrumentation: principles of a seismograph; feedback system; digital Data; global seismographic networks..
  • 9. Plane waves in horizontally stratified media; reflection and transmission coefficients for SH and waves.
  • 10. Surface waves: Love and Rayleigh waves; propagator matrices
  • 11. The Rayleigh principle; differential kernels.
  • 12. Inversion of surface wave dispersion data as an example of an inverse problem
  • 13. Free oscillations of the Earth; spherical harmonics
  • 14. Travel times of seismic waves, I: flat geometry, refraction and reflection, inclined layers, crustal and upper mantle studies using artificial sources.
  • 15. Travel times of seismic waves, II: spherical geometry. The direct and inverse problem. The Herglotz - Wiechert method.
  • 16. Anelasticity; physical dispersion; measurements of Q .
  • 17. Spherically symmetric Earth structure from inversion of travel times, surface waves and free oscillation data. Adams- Williamson equation.
  • 18. Location of earthquakes; Bulletin of International Seismological Centre; global seismicity
  • 19. Seismic source mechanism from signs of first arrivals of P- and S- waves; eismic magnitudes: mb and Ms; frequency distribution log N = a + b * M
  • 20. Excitation of surface waves and normal modes by earthquake sources
  • 21. The centroid-moment tensor method; application to systematic study of global seismicity; examples for Tonga-Kermadec, Central Asia, North America.
  • 22. Seismic tomography, I: the data sets and formulation of the inverse problem for 3-D Earth structure.
  • 23. Seismic tomography, II: three dimensional Earth structure, its geophysical and geological implications.
  • 24. Applications of seismology, I: oil exploration
  • 25. Applications of seismology, II: discrimination between earthquakes and nuclear explosions.