EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING

EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING
Plate Interaction
Formation of Earth’s Surface
Features
Earthquake
Generation
As a result of the differential motion between
them, tectonic plates interact with one another
in three distinct ways, giving rise to an
assortment of effects on the earth’s surface.

When two plates diverge, a rift is developed,

creating a condition where molten basaltic
magma from the asthenosphere rises to lift
up the plate edges and create new crust.
The process of the plate divergence,
known as sea-floor spreading has been
responsible for the formation of the mid-
oceanic ridges and rises (submarine
mountain chains) as well as the deep
valleys in between.
The Marianas Trench with a depth of
8063 m are both located at the
boundaries where an oceanic plate
subducts under a continental one.
Where plates edges slide past each other,
crust is neither created nor destroyed,
nor do changes occur on the surface of
the earth.
The boundaries where this type of
interaction occurs are often called
transform faults. A transform fault
develops where the axis of a spreading
ridge or a subduction zone has been offset.
EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING
CAUSE OF PLATE MOVEMENT
Arthur Holmes
(1890 - 1965)
English geologist Arthur Holmes made not one but two
major contributions to our under-standing of how the
Earth works. He was the first earth scientist to grasp
the mechanical and thermal implications of mantle
convection, and he widely applied the newly-developed
method of radioactive dating to minerals in the first
attempt to quantitatively estimate the age of the Earth.
Many theories have been offered to
explain the plate movement. The
prevalent one so far is the convection
current theory.
“Convection current”

Convection Current is defined as “a

process of continuous heating up of
liquids or gases by the process
called as Convection. ’’
This theory, or group of theories, as there
are many variants, postulates that heat is
being generated within the earth by
radioactive disintegration and that this
heat is being carried to the surface by
gigantic convection currents within the
mantle, similarly to the way heated air
moves by convection through a cool room.
EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING
INTRAPLATE EARTHQUAKES
Although the vast majority of
earthquakes occur at plate boundaries,
some seismic regions of the earth are far
away from plate boundaries. The
seismicity is referred to as intraplate
seismicity and constitutes a
manifestation of the internal
deformation of a plate.
Plate tectonic