Quantifying damage zones width in strike-slip faults: Insights from a two-dimensional finite-element modeling approach

Abstract

We use a two-dimensional finite-element modeling approach to investigate the structural evolution of strike-slip faults under five different confining pressures and determine how their damage zone widths vary depending on the kinematic. Three representative fault segments are modeled, accounting for movement obliquity forming in pure strike-slip, oblique convergence and oblique divergence scenarios. The elastoplastic constitutive model (Drucker-Prager) was employed to couple an associated flow rule into the initial stress state of a geostatic stage. We applied two empirical methods for determining the width of the damage zone from progressive model response. The first method involves using the plastic strain distribution curve's inflection points, to mathematically fixate the width. The second method uses the standard deviation obtained from a trend Gaussian/Normal probability distribution, with over 98% fit to the plastic strain curve data, simplifying the inference of the strain propagation along the model. The simulation results indicate inverse proportional relationships between confining pressure and both porosity and plastic strain intensity, while showing a direct proportional relationship with the damage zone width. For fault zone width quantification, results show convergence between the methods, revealing widths of 2.46–2.65 m for oblique divergence (displacement of 0.20 m), 2.65–3.55 m for pure strike-slip (displacement of 0.20 m), and 4.36–4.46 m for oblique convergence zones (displacement of 0.70 m). The pure strike-slip and the oblique convergence damage zone width results align well with outcrop observations of faults with similar kinematics from the literature, underscoring the significance of numerical modeling as a valuable tool for measure and study the mechanics of characterizing the nucleation of fault zones and quantifying the width of the damage zone.