Abstract
An attempt is made to interpret the gravity anomalies over an inclined fault with variable density contrast. The decrease of density contrast with depth in sedimentary rocks is approximated by a quadratic function. The anomaly equation of an inclined fault is derived with the quadratic density function. The constantsa 0,a 1 anda 2 of the quadratic density function can be found from the known density-depth values. A synthetic anomaly profile of the fault model is interpreted by the non-linear optimisation technique using the Marquardt algorithm. The distances are measured from an arbitrary reference point and thus the origin of the fault model is also treated as an unknown parameter. For the assumed values of the constantsa 0,a 1 anda 2, the various parameters of the fault model are found by the non-linear optimisation technique. The convergence of the method is shown by plotting the values of the objective function, lamda, and the parameters of the fault model with respect to iteration number. The two parameters inclination and origin are found to be correlated. The same program is used to interpret the gravity anomalies with different density contrasts. Finally, the use of modelling with the quadratic density function is discussed.
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Rao, D.B. Analysis of gravity anomalies over an inclined fault with quadratic density function. PAGEOPH 123, 250–260 (1985). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00877021
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00877021