Fractal and spectral investigation of the shallow seismicity in Taiwan

Abstract

We studied the whole and aftershock-depleted shallow (depth ≤ 30 km) Taiwanese seismicity from 1990 to 2017 by using several independent methods. The coefficient of variations and the Allan Factor have revealed that time-clustering characterizes not only the time distribution of the whole seismic catalogue, but also that of the aftershock-depleted one, although this displays time-clustering at larger timescales. In particular the Allan Factor shows that at small timescales the seismic process of the whole as well as the aftershock-depleted one can be well described by a Poisson process. The detrended fluctuation analysis clearly evidence persistence in the interevent times and weak persistence or randomness in the magnitudes. The singular spectrum analysis of the daily counts in the aftershock-depleted catalogue reveals the existence of quasi-monthly and bi-weekly periodicities. Furthermore, quasi-annual and quasi-semestral periodicities have been identified that strengthen the link between seismic activity in Taiwan and Earth’s tides.