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Benchmarking numerical models of brittle thrust wedges

Publikation: Bidrag til tidsskrift/Konferencebidrag i tidsskrift /Bidrag til avis › Tidsskriftartikel › Forskning › peer review

DOI

  • Susanne J H Buiter, University of Oslo, Geological Survey of Norway
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  • Guido Schreurs, Universitat Bern
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  • Markus Albertz, ExxonMobil
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  • Taras V. Gerya, ETH Zürich
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  • Boris Kaus, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz
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  • Walter Landry, California Institute of Technology
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  • Laetitia le Pourhiet, Sorbonne Universités, UPMC Univ Paris 06
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  • Yury Mishin, ETH Zürich
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  • David L. Egholm
  • Michele Cooke, University of Massachusetts
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  • Bertrand Maillot, Universite de Cergy-Pontoise
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  • Cedric Thieulot, Utrecht University, University of Oslo
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  • Tony Crook, Three Cliffs Geomechanical Analysis
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  • Dave May, ETH Zürich
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  • Pauline Souloumiac, Ecole des Mines
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  • Christopher Beaumont, Dalhousie University

We report quantitative results from three brittle thrust wedge experiments, comparing numerical results directly with each other and with corresponding analogue results. We first test whether the participating codes reproduce predictions from analytical critical taper theory. Eleven codes pass the stable wedge test, showing negligible internal deformation and maintaining the initial surface slope upon horizontal translation over a frictional interface. Eight codes participated in the unstable wedge test that examines the evolution of a wedge by thrust formation from a subcritical state to the critical taper geometry. The critical taper is recovered, but the models show two deformation modes characterised by either mainly forward dipping thrusts or a series of thrust pop-ups. We speculate that the two modes are caused by differences in effective basal boundary friction related to different algorithms for modelling boundary friction. The third experiment examines stacking of forward thrusts that are translated upward along a backward thrust. The results of the seven codes that run this experiment show variability in deformation style, number of thrusts, thrust dip angles and surface slope. Overall, our experiments show that numerical models run with different numerical techniques can successfully simulate laboratory brittle thrust wedge models at the cm-scale. In more detail, however, we find that it is challenging to reproduce sandbox-type setups numerically, because of frictional boundary conditions and velocity discontinuities. We recommend that future numerical-analogue comparisons use simple boundary conditions and that the numerical Earth Science community defines a plasticity test to resolve the variability in model shear zones.

OriginalsprogEngelsk
TidsskriftJournal of Structural Geology
Vol/bind92
Sider (fra-til)140-177
Antal sider38
ISSN0191-8141
DOI
StatusUdgivet - 1 nov. 2016

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