The relative amplitudes of mantle heterogeneity in P velocity, S velocity and density from free‐oscillation data

Abstract

Splitting functions retrieved from spectra of the free oscillations are sensitive to the lateral variations in P velocity (α), S velocity (β), and density (ρ) simultaneously. In this study they are used to constrain the values of the ratios d ln α/d ln β and d ln ρ/d ln α for the lower mantle. Assuming that the upper mantle structure is obtainable from model M84A (this is not a crucial assumption as experiments indicate), the optimal value of d ln α/d ln β inferred from the modal data is 0.44 and d ln α/d ln β lies in the interval (0.39, 0.60) with 75 per cent confidence, strongly discriminating against the value (0.8) often used. The constraints on density structure of the current data are insufficient to yield new definitive results. The analysis demonstrates, however, that the value of d ln ρ/d ln α could be estimated from a larger set of modal data. Copyright © 1991, Wiley Blackwell. All rights reserved