The observation of a universal shape regularity in earthquake frequency-magnitude distributions
- 1 February 1980
- journal article
- Published by Seismological Society of America (SSA) in Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America
- Vol. 70 (1) , 349-362
- https://doi.org/10.1785/bssa0700010349
Abstract
On performing a statistical analysis of the data available from both the National Geophysical and Solar Terrestrial Data Center (NGSDC) and other, smaller data bases, a convincing shape regularity was observed in the derived earthquake frequency-magnitude (f-M) distributions. The f-M distributions were obtained from sets of events originating within widely separated regions on the Earth. The regions have geological diversity and areas greater than 6 × 105 km2. To within estimated error, the shape of total world data agrees with similar plots of data subsets taken from these eight separate regions of the Earth.Keywords
This publication has 6 references indexed in Scilit:
- Frequency-magnitude-time relationships in the NGSDC earthquake data fileBulletin of the Seismological Society of America, 1979
- A catalog of instrumentally determined earthquakes in China (magnitude ≧6) compiled from various sourcesBulletin of the Seismological Society of America, 1978
- Truncated exponential frequency-magnitude relationship in earthquake statisticsBulletin of the Seismological Society of America, 1977
- The energy release in great earthquakesJournal of Geophysical Research, 1977
- Study of regional seismicity and associated problemsBulletin of the Seismological Society of America, 1970
- An instrumental earthquake magnitude scale*Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, 1935