Eur. Phys. J. B 59, 93-97 (2007)
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjb/e2007-00259-3

Dynamical evolution of clustering in complex network of earthquakes

¹ Department of Physical Engineering, Mie University, Tsu, Mie, 514-8507, Japan
² Institut Supérieur des Matériaux et Mécaniques Avancés, 44 F. A. Bartholdi, 72000 Le Mans, France
³ College of Science and Technology, Nihon University, Chiba, 274-8501, Japan

Corresponding author: ^a suabe@sf6.so-net.ne.jp

Received: 12 December 2006
Revised: 28 June 2007
Published online: 5 October 2007

Abstract

The network approach plays a distinguished role in contemporary science of complex systems/phenomena. Such an approach has been introduced into seismology in a recent work [S. Abe, N. Suzuki, Europhys. Lett. 65, 581 (2004)]. Here, we discuss the dynamical property of the earthquake network constructed in California and report the discovery that the values of the clustering coefficient remain stationary before main shocks, suddenly jump up at the main shocks, and then slowly decay following a power law to become stationary again. Thus, the dynamical network approach characterizes main shocks in a peculiar manner.