Fluid mechanics of free subduction on a sphere. Part 1. The axisymmetric case

DOI10.1017/JFM.2021.871MaRDI QIDQ5160156zbMATH OpenOpenAlexFDO

Authors Alexander Chamolly, Neil M. Ribe

Publication date 28 October 2021

Published in Journal of Fluid Mechanics (Search for Journal in Brave)

Full work available at URL https://arxiv.org/abs/2107.05141

boundary integral method longitudinal buckling instability mantle convection oceanic Earth lithosphere point-force Green function scaling analysis thin viscous shell theory

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Fluid-solid interactions (including aero- and hydro-elasticity, porosity, etc.) (74F10) Geophysical solid mechanics (74L05) Boundary element methods applied to problems in fluid mechanics (76M15) Geophysical flows (76U60) Geological problems (86A60)

Abstract: To understand how spherical geometry influences the dynamics of gravity-driven subduction of oceanic lithosphere on Earth, we study a simple model of a thin and dense axisymmetric shell of thickness

h

and viscosity

e t a_{1}

sinking in a spherical body of fluid with radius

R_{0}

and a lower viscosity

e t a_{0}

. Using scaling analysis based on thin viscous shell theory, we identify a fundamental length scale, the `bending length'

l_{b}

, and two key dimensionless parameters that control the dynamics: the `flexural stiffness'

S t = (e t a_{1} / e t a_{0}) (h / l_{b})^{3}

and the `sphericity number'

S i g m a = (l_{b} / R_{0}) c o t h e t a_{t}

, where

h e t a_{t}

is the angular radius of the subduction trench. To validate the scaling analysis, we obtain a suite of instantaneous numerical solutions using a boundary-element method based on new analytical point-force Green functions that satisfy free-slip boundary conditions on the sphere's surface. To isolate the effect of sphericity, we calculate the radial sinking speed

V

and the hoop stress resultant

T_{2}

at the leading end of the subducted part of the shell, both normalised by their `flat-Earth' values (i.e., for

S i g m a = 0

). For reasonable terrestrial values of

e t a_{1} / e t a_{0}

(

a p p r o x

several hundred), sphericity has a modest effect on

V

, which is reduced by

< 7 %

for large plates such as the Pacific plate and by up to 34% for smaller plates such as the Cocos and Philippine Sea plates. However, sphericity has a much greater effect on

T_{2}

, increasing it by up to 64% for large plates and 240% for small plates. This result has important implications for the growth of longitudinal buckling instabilities in subducting spherical shells.

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