Geothermal Anomalies and Coupling with the Ionosphere before the 2020 Jiashi Ms6.4 Earthquake

Abstract

Rock temperature reflects the adjustment in crustal stress, and the fluctuation of ionospheric electron concentration is closely related to short-term disturbances of the stress field. Their coupling may reveal short-term effects before strong earthquakes. This study explores the rock temperature changes and mechanical-electrical coupling in the lithosphere–ionosphere before the Jiashi Ms6.4 earthquake on 19 January 2020. The observed data were detrended by general polynomial piecewise fitting; three observation points within 150 km of the epicenter were found to show significant temperature fluctuations in the 15 days before the earthquake. The peak occurred synchronously five days before the earthquake, and the variation range was approximately 10−3 orders of magnitude. Five days before the earthquake, the electromagnetic satellite Zhangheng-1 synchronously observed an anomalous electron concentration in orbit near the epicenter, with a maximum value of 2.01 × 1010 m−3. The loading/unloading response ratio (LURR) was calculated using small earthquakes within 100 km of the epicenter; it showed that the large changes in rock temperature and the ionosphere occurred at high LURR, indicating high-stress accumulation in the region. Various anomalies appeared simultaneously and may indicate fault rupture, which may be caused by an acoustic-gravity wave, indicating a synchronous coupling between the lithosphere atmosphere and the ionosphere.