Shear-wave splitting in the crust beneath the southeast Capital area of North China

This study focuses on the southeast Capital area of North China (38.5–39.85° N, 115.5–118.5° E). Shear-wave splitting parameters at 20 seismic stations are obtained by a systematic analysis method applied to data recorded by the Capital Area Seismograph Network (CASN) between the years 2002 and 2005. Although some differences in the results are observed, the average fast-wave polarization is N88.2° W ± 40.7° and the average normalized slow wave time delay is 3.55 ± 2.93 ms/km. The average polarization is consistent with the regional maximum horizontal compressive stress and also with the maximum principal strain derived from global positioning system measurements in North China. In spite of the uneven distribution of faults around the array stations that likely introduce some amount of scatter in the shear-wave splitting measurements, site-dependent polarizations of fast shear wave are clearly observed: in the northern half of the study area, the polarizations at CASN stations show E–W direction, whereas in the southern half the polarizations exhibit a variety of possible azimuths, thus suggesting dissimilar stress field and tectonic frame in both areas. Comparing the splitting results with those previously obtained in the northwest part of the region, we find a difference in polarization of about 20° between the southeast and northwest parts of the Capital area; also, in the southeast Capital area the average time delay is smaller than in the northwest Capital area, thus making clear that the magnitude of crustal seismic anisotropy is not the same in the two zones. Being the shear-wave splitting polarizations in the southeast Capital area, which lies on the basin, clearly different from the observed polarizations in the northwest Capital area, where uplifts and basin converge, it is quite evident that the shear-wave splitting results are consequence of the tectonics and stress field affecting the two regions.