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do you know is there's a way to simulate a earthquake with the finite elements method using the Partial Differential Equation Toolbox on Matlab ? My goal is to visualize the amplitude of a (Rayleigh) wave in all points of a forest for different frequencies. And if possible to see what are the modes of vibration of the trees. Maybe this is a silly question but I'm getting started. Thanks !

Steph
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  • Please provide enough code so others can better understand or reproduce the problem. – Community May 14 '22 at 16:46
  • You need to figure out how to express the boundary conditions that will represent your earthquake. I think the root cause is one tectonic plate sliding over another. Are you modeling a single plate? Is this a 2D planar model or 3D? You need to think less about Matlab and more about the physics. – duffymo May 14 '22 at 20:11
  • @duffymo Thanks for your answer. Yes of course, but Matlab has good tools for finite elements analysis. Actually I wanted to use a simpler model : a Rayleigh wave instead of simulating tectonic plates. And I need a 3D model because I expect the trees to have bending modes. – Steph May 15 '22 at 17:10
  • Ideally, it would look something like that : zupimages.net/up/22/19/eadu.png – Steph May 15 '22 at 17:16
  • Okay, how do you represent a Rayleigh wave boundary condition in your 3D FEA model? Shear, compression, or a combination? – duffymo May 17 '22 at 13:26
  • Ideally a combinaison but I could try with compression or shear alone first. – Steph May 17 '22 at 15:07
  • This is a hyperbolic equation. I would advise applying time-varying displacement boundary conditions on one of your 3D boundary planes. The nodes on the z = 0 plane should receive z(t) = zmax*sin(2*pi*fz*t), x(t) = xmax*sin(2*pi*fx*t) displacements. Pick max displacement magnitudes and frequencies. Use Fourier series if it's more complex loading. – duffymo May 18 '22 at 11:55

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