Experimental Evidence of melt-brake at seismic rates in sedimentary rocks

Frictional melts generated along seismic faults theoretically may act either as a lubricant or as a viscous brake. Present geological and geophysical evidence supports melt-lubrication, which is also in good agreement with extreme strength weakening in laboratory frictional experiments. On the contrary, the strengthening behavior of viscous melts at seismic rates is not well reported, especially in sedimentary rocks. Here we provide laboratory evidence of progressive increase in frictional resistance on sandstone at a slip rate of 1.3 m/s with melt generation. The produced melt/pseudotachylyte is observed with Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM), and is in-situ analyzed with X-ray diffraction analysis (XRD) and Transmission X-ray Microscopy (TXM) in synchrotron radiation. These analytical results show that the formation of pseudotachylyte is composed of pulverized quartz grains suspending in amorphous melts from thermally decomposed clay minerals. The observation of TXM also indicates that the shapes of quartz grains in the slip zone vary from rounded in the central area to angular on the rim. In-situ microstructures and high frictional resistance of sandstones in experiments indicate that the dominant strengthening mechanism is possibly controlled by viscous melts with suspending quartz grains. The melt rheology at high slip rates is not well understood, but the frictional behavior of melt with nano-sized quartz grains appears to be rheopetic instead of melt lubrication and/or powder lubrication. Thus, it suggests that the first-time rupture of sedimentary faults is not lubricated by melts during earthquake; in contrast melts from thermally decomposed clay minerals with suspending quartz grains produced by faulting may be an important process for the dynamic strengthening of faults.