Lab 6, Part 1- Seismic Record Sections

(Part 2 will be assigned later; the complete Lab 6 will be due Thursday night, 7 April, at midnight)

The purpose of this lab is to learn how to download your own data, and to create several different plots
of seismic record sections. A seismic record section is a series of seismograms that is plotted in some
particular order. Typically the x-axis is time, and then the seismograms are separated in the y-direction
and ordered by source-station distance OR source-station azimuth.

The bandpass filter that is applied to the seismograms can have a dramatic effect on what is visible. The
frequency limits of the bandpass is one of several important choices that are needed when plotting
record sections.

The lab uses a few non-standard Matlab functions. Seismic waveforms are available from the IRIS Data
Management Center.

Exercise 1: Selecting and downloading data

Feel free to work in groups to select events and download/share the data! We will use the web-based
tool Wilber 3 to select an event (earthquake), then select stations that recorded that data, and
download SAC data files. First, go to:

http://ds.iris.edu/wilber3/find_event

and choose one large event (Magnitude 6.5+) and near-source stations (<20 degrees). The default
station network is GSN, but you can change that to include other networks, in order to get more near-
source stations. (Use the Wilber option “choose one station every X degrees” to get a reasonable
number of stations. You should have 20-30. You can also use the “show record section” button to see a
preview of what your data will look like before you finalize your station choices and download it).

Download parameters:
- Download only the vertical broadband component (code named BHZ).
- Select the length of the record to be 0 minutes before event time, and 30 minutes after event time.
- file type should be the default, SAC binary (little endian)
- bundle as some type of zip file
- add your name and email for notification of the download.

Then, repeat the event and station selection process, choosing one large event and teleseismic stations,
from the GSN, for example. Download the SAC files in the same manner.

Exercise 2: Reading and plotting SAC files

First, you may find it helpful to add the paths to the directories/folders where you are storing your
functions and scripts, and the folder where you are storing your data. Then, OCTAVE will know to check
these folders when you call functions or load data. To load the folder OCTAVEDIR and all subfolders:

addpath(genpath('C:\Users\annafoster\Documents\OCTAVEDIR'));

Then, using the extra functions included with this lab:

Read in a file using:

[t,data,hdr]=fget_sac('II.NNA.10.BH1.M.2018.122.063841.SAC');

You can then plot the time series simply by:

plot(t,data);

Find information about the earthquake and station (including source-station distance (great-circle
distance is distance in angular degrees) and backazimuth, azimuth) using:

rdSacHead('II.NNA.10.BH1.M.2018.122.063841.SAC')

Now plot all the stations on one figure, using an offset in the amplitude (y-axis) based on source-station
distance. Note: you will want to scale the amplitude- one way to do this is based on the maximum
amplitude of each trace, so all of the values will range from 0 to +-1 (something like:
newdata=data./max(data)). However, then you will not see any variation in amplitude- so it might be
better to pick one constant value and scale all of your traces by that.

Now, try different frequency bands using:

newdata=bandpass(t,data,lowf,highf);

where lowf, highf are the bounds of your filter in Hz - for example, a common surface wave band is
(.01,.03). Select a band that you think brings out some interesting features! (Note- you may want to
change your amplitude scaling value after filtering).

Finally, choose one of your data sets,and arrange the stations by azimuth (event to station orientation-
not backazimuth!). Again, select the best amplitude scaling and frequency filtering to show off your
daya. Save the 3 record sections- make sure the event, distance or azimuth, time, and frequency band
are clearly labeled, as well as the axes.

Exercise 3: Thinking about record sections

Answer the following questions.

1. Describe the near-source record section. Are there any stations that look very different? Do you
see clear P wave arrivals? What about the surface waves?
2. Describe the teleseismic record section. Are there any stations that look very different? Do you
see clear P wave arrivals? What about the surface waves?
3. On your teleseismic record section by distance: Can you identify any other phases? Using a
travel time plot from a reference model with phases identified (available in the slides from class,
or use the TauP program, if you like), try to identify at least 4 body wave phases. Label them on
the figure (this doesn’t have to be in Matlab, you can draw on a pdf, for example).
4. Compare your record section by azimuth to the record section by distance for the same event.
Do you notice any trends in amplitude of the waves that are unique to the azimuth
arrangement? To the distance arrangement?