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Fractal Plate Tectonics

D. Sornette·V. F. Pisarenko
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Abstract

We analyze in details the statistical significance of the claim by Bird [2002] of a power law distribution of plate areas covering the Earth and confirm that the power law with exponent 0.25 +- 0.05 is the most robust and parsimonious model for all plates, including the very largest plates, when taking into account the constraint that the plates areas must sum up to 4 pi steradians. We propose a general class of fragmentation models that rationalize this observation and discuss the implications for the earth dynamics and the general self-organization of tectonic deformations at multiple scales.

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D. Sornette, V. F. Pisarenko. 2002-02-19. Fractal Plate Tectonics. https://doi.org/10.1029/2002gl015043

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