Seismic waves

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Geology UAJ&K

Azhar MAhgmood

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Seismic Waves

Defination of seismic waves :

A wave of energy that is generated by an earthquake or  other earth vibration and that travels within the earth or along its surface.

Around 132 AD, Chinese scientist Chang Heng invented the first seismoscope, an instrument that could register the occurrence of an earthquake.

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History

A wave can be described as a disturbance that travels through a medium from one location to another location. 

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What is wave…?

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Diagram of wave

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How they create…??

• Seismic waves are the waves of energy caused by the sudden breaking of rock within the earth or an explosion. They are the energy that travels through the earth and is recorded on seismographs.

• There are several different kinds of seismic waves, and they all move in different ways. The two main types of waves are body waves and surface waves.

1. Body waves Primary waves Secondary waves2 . Surface waves Love waves Rayleigh waves

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Types of seismic Waves

Body waves are those waves which travells through the interior of the earth.

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Body waves

P Waves (compression wave) The first kind of body wave is the P wave or primary

wave. This is the fastest kind of seismic wave. The P wave can move through solid rock and fluids, like water or the liquid layers of the earth. It pushes and pulls the rock it moves through just like sound waves push and pull the air.

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Body Waves

P-waves are the fastest waves created by an earthquake. They travel through the Earth’s interior and can pass through both solid and molten rock. They shake the ground back and forth – like a Slinky – in their travel direction, but do little damage as they only move buildings up and down.

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Movement of p-waves…

In air, they take the form of sound waves, hence they travel at the speed of sound. Typical speeds are 330 m/s in air, 1450 m/s in water and about 5000 m/s in granite.

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SPEED OF THE PRIMARY WAVES

Primary waves (P-waves) are compressional waves that are longitudinal in nature. P waves are pressure waves that travel faster than other waves through the earth to arrive at seismograph stations first hence the name "Primary". These waves can travel through any type of material, including fluids, and can travel at nearly twice the speed of S waves

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S wave (transverse wave) The second type of body wave is the S wave or

secondary wave, which is the second wave you feel in an earthquake. An S wave is slower than a P wave and can only move through solid rock. This wave moves rock up and down, or side-to-side.

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Body Waves

S-waves lag behind P-waves as they travel 1.7 times slower and can only pass through solid rock. However they do more damage because they’re bigger and shake the ground vertically and horizontally.

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Secondary (shear) waves

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Traveling….

S-waves are shear waves, which move particles perpendicularly to their direction of propagation. They can propagate through solid rocks because these rocks have enough shear strength. The shear strength is one of the forces that hold the rock together, and prevent it from falling into pieces. Liquids do not have the same shear strength: that is why, if you take a glass of water and suddenly remove the glass, the water will not keep its glass shape and will just flow away. In fact, it is just a matter of rigidity: S-waves need a medium rigid enough to propagate. Hence, S-waves do not propagate through liquids.

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Why secondary waves cannot pass through liquid ?

Surface waves are those waves which travels through the surface of the earth.

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Surface waves

1. Love waves A type of seismic surface wave in which

particles move with a side-to-side motion perpendicular to the main propagation of the earthquake. The amplitude of this motion decreases with depth. Love waves cause the rocks they pass through to change in shape. They travel faster than Rayleigh waves.

 the Love waves at about 3.5 km/s

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Surface waves

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Diagram

A type of seismic surface wave that moves with a rolling motion that consists of a combination of particle motion perpendicular and parallel to the main direction of wave propagation. The amplitude of this motion decreases with depth. Like primary waves, Rayleigh waves are alternatingly compressional and extensional (they cause changes in the volume of the rocks they pass through). Rayleigh waves travel slower than Love waves.

the Rayleigh waves at 3.0 km/s 

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2. Rayleigh waves

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Diagram

The Rayleigh waves "roll" along the surface, described as "up and over backwards roll." 

These surface waves do most of the damage to structures. The Love waves shake us from side to side and the Rayleigh waves shake us up and down

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How they travels??

On the basis of seismic waves we differentiate different layers of earth

On the basis of seismic waves we sub classified the layers.

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Uses of seismic waves

Use in the identification of hydrocarbons reservoirs.

Oil and gas exploration.

That’s end.

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Uses;