On-demand synthetic seismograms from the IRIS DMC

The IRIS Data Management Center (DMC) has served waveform data to the seismology community for over 30 years. This presentation highlights a new, on-demand synthetic seismogram service that will complement the observation-based data we have traditionally distributed. We are computing a global-scale database of Green's functions from which users can request synthetic seismograms for arbitrary source and receiver parameters and Earth models. The multi-terabyte scale database of Green's functions is computed by the spectral-element method AxiSEM for a selection of spherically symmetric Earth models (PREM, IASP91, AK135) with anisotropy and attenuation. The resolution of the simulations will be between 2-8 to about 100 sec periods (final resolution to be determined by computational resources available). The synthetics are accessible using a simple web service that returns synthetics according to specified source-receiver combination, Earth model and signal band. On-the-fly post-processing such as convolution with a moment tensor (or specified Global CMT solution) and source-time function is being developed. This service is intended to return synthetic seismograms quickly, making it useful for studying variations in source properties, Earth models or temporal changes in instrument responses. It is also designed to be callable by simple scripts and works well in automated processing. The DMC will also provide a command line script to download selections of synthetics. This new dataset and related service provide a powerful tool in multiple areas of study where synthetic seismograms are useful.