Thorsten W. Becker Jackson School of Geosciences The University of Texas at Austin SKS splitting compilation

This work was made possible by the willingness of seismologists to share their results, and our database is largely based on, and reusing, the compilation efforts of G. Barruol, A. Wüstefeld, M. Fouch, D. Schutt, and P. Silver. In particular, our database is not meant to reproduce the ongoing efforts by G. Barruol to keep Wüstefeld's et al.'s (2009) SKS database updated.

However, our compilation does hold back-azimuth and event data for some of the studies, information not available for some of the other compilations. References for the source data bases we use include:

• Wüstefeld, A. and Bokelmann, G. H. R. and Barruol, G. and Montagner, J. P.: Identifying global seismic anisotropy patterns by correlating shear-wave splitting and surface-wave data, Phys. Earth Planet. Int., 176, 198-212, 2009. Database available online at http://www.gm.univ-montp2.fr/splitting/DB/. (Version as of 05/2011 was used for Becker et al., 2012; for the current version, see below).
• Fouch, M.: Upper Mantle Anisotropy Database, was at http://geophysics.asu.edu/anisotropy/upper/, accessed 06/2006, 2006.
• Silver, P. G.: Seismic anisotropy beneath the continents: probing the depths of geology, Ann. Rev. Earth Planet. Sci., 24, 385-432, 1996.

Current JSG Geodynamics SKS data base

• current JSG Geodynamics individual SKS split database (December 01, 2024) with and without the automated analyses of Liu and Wolf.
• station-averaged SKS splits based on the updated database (December 01, 2024) with and without the automated splits.
  • all splits including the automated analyses of Liu and Wolf, averaged on 0.5, 1, and 2 degree grids.
  • all non-automated splits (excluding Liu and Wolf), averaged on 0.5, 1, and 2 degree grids.
• SKS database format description

Besides the studies used for Becker et al. (2012), we currently include additional work by several additional studies including those listed below (which may have later been included in the Wuestefeld/Montpellier database, and we attempt to check for, and then remove, duplicates)

• An updated (06/02/2022) version of Barruol and Wuestefeld et al.'s (2009) splitting database (IRIS copy).
• Anderson, M. L., G. Zandt, E. Triep, M. Fouch, and S. Beck (2004): Anisotropy and mantle flow in the Chile-Argentina subduction zone from shear wave splitting analysis, Geophys. Res. Lett., 31, L23608, doi:10.1029/2004GL020906.
• Di Leo, J. F., J. Wookey, J. O. S. Hammond, J.-M. Kendall, S. Kaneshima, H. Inoue, T. Yamashina, and P. Harjadi (2012), Mantle flow in regions of complex tectonics: Insights from Indonesia, Geochem. Geophys. Geosyst., 13, Q12008, doi:10.1029/2012GC004417.
• MacDougall, J. G., K. M. Fischer, and M. L. Anderson (2012), Seismic anisotropy above and below the subducting Nazca lithosphere in southern South America, J. Geophys. Res., 117, B12306, doi:10.1029/2012JB009538.
• Leon Soto, G., E. Sandvol, J. F. Ni, L. M. Flesch, T. M. Hearn, F. Tilmann, Y. J. Chen, and L. Brown (2012): Significant and vertically coherent seismic anisotropy beneath Eastern Tibet. J. Geophys. Res., doi:10.1029/2011JB008919.
• Hicks, S. P., Nippress, S. E. J., Rietbrock, A. (2012), Sub-slab mantle anisotropy beneath south-central Chile, Earth Planet. Sci. Lett., 357, 203-213.
• Miller, M. S., Allam, A. A., Becker, T. W. and Di Leo, J., and Wookey, J. (2013): Constraints on the geodynamic evolution of the westernmost Mediterranean and northwest Africa from shear wave splitting analysis. Earth Planet. Sci. Lett., 375, 234-243. (PDF)
  • Miller et al. (2013) results for good and fair measurements in our SKS database format
• Refayee, H. A., B. B. Yang, K. H. Liu, and S. S. Gao (2013): Mantle flow and lithosphere-asthenosphere coupling beneath the southwestern edge of the North American Craton: Constraints from shear-wave splitting measurements, Earth Planet. Sci. Lett., http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.epsl.2013.01.031.
• Calixto, F. J., D. Robinson, E. Sandvol, S. Kay, D. Abt, K. Fischer, B. Heit, X. Yuan, D. Comte, and P. Alvarado (2014): Shear wave splitting and shear wave splitting tomography of the southern Puna plateau, Geophys. J. Int., 199, 688-699.
• Porritt, R. W., Becker, T. W., and Monsalve, G. (2014): Seismic anisotropy and slab dynamics from SKS splitting recorded in Colombia. Geophys. Res. Lett., 41, doi:10.1002/2014GL061958. (PDF)
• Diaz, J. and J. Gallart (2014): Seismic anisotropy from the Variscan core of Iberia to the Western African Craton: New constrains on upper mantle flow at regional scales, Earth Planet. Sci. Lett., 394, 48-57.
• Bastow I. D, Julia J., do Nascimento A. F., Fuck R.A., Buckthorp, T.L., McClellan, J., J. et al. (2015): Upper mantle anisotropy of the Borborema Province, NE Brazil: Implications for intra-plate deformation and sub-cratonic asthenospheric flow, Tectonophys., 657, 81-93.
• Bodmer, M., Toomey, D. R., Hooft, E. E., and Braunmiller, J. (2015) Seismic anisotropy beneath the Juan de Fuca plate system: Evidence for heterogeneous mantle flow, Geology, 43, doi:G37181.1.
• Hodges, Michael, and Meghan S. Miller. Mantle flow at the highly arcuate northeast corner of the Lesser Antilles subduction zone: Constraints from shear-wave splitting analyses. Lithospher, 7, 579-587, 2015.
• Idarraga-García, J., Kendall, J. .-M. and Vargas, C. A. (2016), Shear wave anisotropy in northwestern South America and its link to the Caribbean and Nazca subduction geodynamics. Geochem. Geophys. Geosyst., doi:10.1002/2016GC006323.
• S. Subašić, S. Prevolnik, D. Herak, and M. Herak. Observations of SKS splitting beneath the Central and Southern External Dinarides in the Adria-Eurasia convergence zone. Tectonophys., http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.tecto.2017.03.027, 2017.
• McPherson, A. M., Christensen, D. H., Abers, G. A., and Tape, C. (2020). Shear wave splitting and mantle flow beneath Alaska. J. Geophy. Res., 125, e2019JB018329.
• Estève, C. and P. Audet, A. J. Schaeffer, D. L. Schutt, R. C. Aster, and Joel F. Cubley (2020). Seismic evidence for craton chiseling and displacement of lithospheric mantle by the Tintina fault in the northern Canadian Cordillera. Geology, doi:10.1130/G47688.1.
• Lucas, E. M., Nyblade, A. A., Accardo, N. J., Lloyd, A. J., Wiens, D. A., Aster, R. C., et al. (2022). Shear wave splitting across Antarctica: Implications for upper mantle seismic anisotropy. Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth, 127, e2021JB023325.
• Birkey, A., Ford, H.A., 2023. Anisotropic structure of the australian continent. Frontiers in Earth Science 10, doi:10.3389/314.
• Grund, M., Ritter, J.R., 2018. Widespread seismic anisotropy in Earth’s lowermost mantle beneath the Atlantic and Siberia. Geology 47, 123–126.
• results from the automated USArray analysis (see above) of
  • Liu, K., Elsheikh, A., Lemnifi, A., Purevsuren, U., Ray, M., Refayee, H., Yang, B., Yu, Y., Gao, S., 2014. A uniform database 381 of teleseismic shear wave splitting measurements for the western and central United States. Geochemistry, Geophysics, 382 Geosystems 15, 20752085. doi:10.1002/2014GC005267.
  • Wolf, J., Becker, T.W., Garnero, E., Liu, K. H. and West, J.D. (submitted): Comprehensive global dataset of 300,000 uniformly processed shear-wave splitting measurements with regular update. Geophysical Journal International

Database as of Becker et al. (2012)

• Fouch, M.J., and J.D. West (2011): The mantle flow field beneath the western United States, in prep.
• Civello S., Margheriti L. (2004): Toroidal mantle flow around the Calabrian slab (Italy) from SKS splitting, Geophys. Res. Lett., 31, doi:10.1029/2004GL019607.

• up to date version of the database
• SKS database format description
• old merged database of individual SKS splits from Becker et al. (2012) (containing study duplicates)
• old station-averaged SKS splits used in Becker et al. (2012) (duplicates removed)