An Inversion Model of Receiver Function for Moho Depth Determination Beneath Locations of the Ethiopian Seismic Network Stations and their Surroundings

Birhanu, Abera (2015) An Inversion Model of Receiver Function for Moho Depth Determination Beneath Locations of the Ethiopian Seismic Network Stations and their Surroundings. Masters thesis, Addis Ababa University.

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Abstract

Moho depths or crustal thicknesses at four stations of the Ethiopian Seismic Station Network (ESSN) are estimated from Receiver Functions studies. We used high quality seismic data recorded at ANKE (Ankober), DILA (Dila), HARE (Harar) and SEME (Semera) stations for earthquakes located at epicentral distances ranging from 30o to 100o and magnitude M ≥ 5:5. We applied frequency domain deconvolution technique to remove all effects from the earthquakes source and propagation path to make the RFs dependent only on the structure beneath the seismic stations. A linearized-iterative inversion is applied on the generated radial component of the Receiver functions. From the four stations in the study, the minimum number of teleseismic earthquakes is 14 for Harar while the maximum is 39 for Ankober. The estimated values for the Moho depth are 42 ± 1:7km, 36±2km, 38±2km and 26±2km for Ankober, Dila, Harar and Semera respectively. We have achieved a reasonably good fit between the observed and synthetic RFs which demonstrates the goodness of the inversion. The lowest Moho depth is observed for Semera station which implies a thinned crust while the highest crustal thickness is achieved for Ankober that lies along the western plateau margin. The second low Moho depth is calculated for Dila station while the one for Harar is an intermediate one. Our results agree with previous observations which strengthens the fact that Moho depths estimated for stations that lie within the rift and rift margins are lower than those located in the plateaus. On the other hand, our RFs inversions show low velocity gradient at about 15km depth at Semera stations while high velocity gradient is noticed at Ankober station. This may imply a cooled magma from previous dike or sill intrusions beneath Ankober station while the observation at Semera indicates the existence of melt at that depth.

Item Type:	Thesis (Masters)
Subjects:	G Geography. Anthropology. Recreation > GF Human ecology. Anthropogeography Q Science > Q Science (General) Q Science > QC Physics Q Science > QE Geology
Divisions:	Africana
Depositing User:	Selom Ghislain
Date Deposited:	24 Sep 2018 13:20
Last Modified:	24 Sep 2018 13:20
URI:	http://thesisbank.jhia.ac.ke/id/eprint/5471

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