Crustal Stress Map of Iran: Insight From Seismic and Geodetic Computations

Abstract

We used the focal mechanisms of crustal earthquakes (depth <40 km) in the period 1909–2012 and the available GPS velocities, derived from the data collected between 1999 to 2011, to estimate the magnitude and directions of maximum principal stress and strain rates in Iran. The Pearson product moment correlation was used to find the correlation between the stress field obtained from the focal mechanism stress inversion and that obtained using the seismic and geodetic strain rates. Our assumption is that stresses in a continuum are produced by tectonic forces and the consequent deformation on the crustal scale. Therefore, the direction of the stress and strain (or strain rate) are ideally to be the same. Our results show a strong correlation between the directions of the principal components of stress and strain (rate) obtained using the different data/methods. Using weighted average analysis, we present a new stress map for Iran.