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Science 19 March 2004:
Vol. 303. no. 5665, pp. 1788 - 1789
DOI: 10.1126/science.1095765
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Perspectives

GEOPHYSICS:
Rupture in the Laboratory

Mitiyasu Ohnaka

Earthquakes are triggered when faults in seismically active layers of the Earth rupture. To understand in terms of the underlying physics how these rupture events grow and propagate is currently the subject of laboratory study. In his Perspective, Ohnaka discusses work reported in the same issue by Xia et al. on experimental observations of fracture of inhomogeneous surfaces. These model earthquakes should provide better understanding of the mechanisms that lead to large seismic events in the real world.

The author is at the University of Tokyo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113, Japan, and University College London, Gower Street, London WC1E 6BT, UK. E-mail: ohnaka{at}g05.itscom.net

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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)