A Prospect of Earthquake Prediction Research

Abstract

Earthquakes occur because of abrupt slips on faults due to accumulated stress in the Earth’s crust. Because most of these faults and their mechanisms are not readily apparent, deterministic earthquake prediction is difficult. For effective prediction, complex conditions and uncertain elements must be considered, which necessitates stochastic prediction. In particular, a large amount of uncertainty lies in identifying whether abnormal phenomena are precursors to large earthquakes, as well as in assigning urgency to the earthquake. Any discovery of potentially useful information for earthquake prediction is incomplete unless quantitative modeling of risk is considered. Therefore, this manuscript describes the prospect of earthquake predictability research to realize practical operational forecasting in the near future.