Earthquake cycle modelling using discrete element methods

The aim of this PhD work is to look at the intimate relation between the geometry of a fault and the unraveling of an earthquake rupture. To achieve this goal, the approach is based on developing a new class of models based on discrete elements modelling. In that framework, faults emerge naturally when the medium is put under stress, avoiding to have to prescribe a fault geometry a-priory. In that way it is possible to directly see th interaction between an instantaneous process, the earthquake, and a long term process, the evolution of the fault geometry. Because this new way of approaching earthquakes allows to explore the model parameters in details everywhere in the model at each time step, it will also allow us to explore the different deformation processes involved during the co-seismic deformation.