Unveiling the Activity of a Young Fault: Insights from the 2021 Maduo Earthquake

摘要: Faults grow through fault lengthening and slip accumulation, which are episodic processes related to the repetition of earthquakes. It is most often recorded in geomorphology. Meanwhile, the activity and seismic hazard of the ‘slow-moving’faults are often overlooked due to their weak imprints in landforms, especially at their initial formation stage. The 2021 Mw 7.4 Maduo earthquake triggered a~ 158-km long surface rupture along the poorly-known and geomorphically subtle Jiangcuo fault, which is one of the distributed faults in the Bayan Har block and splays that merge with the Kunlun Pass fault. The slip rate of the Jiangcuo fault is thus crucial for comprehending how the strain is distributed between the major and subsidy faults in the complete fault system of the Bayan Har block, as well as the broader deformation process at a large scale. In this study, we present three sites where the Jiangcuo fault left-laterally …