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Inelastodynamics,Love waves, named afterAugustus Edward Hough Love, are horizontallypolarizedsurface waves. The Love wave is a result of theinterference of many shear waves (S-waves) guided by an elastic layer, which iswelded to an elastic half space on one side while bordering a vacuum on the other side. Inseismology,Love waves (also known asQ waves (Quer: German for lateral)) aresurfaceseismic waves that cause horizontal shifting of the Earth during anearthquake. Augustus Edward Hough Love predicted the existence of Love waves mathematically in 1911. They form a distinct class, different from other types ofseismic waves, such asP-waves andS-waves (bothbody waves), orRayleigh waves (another type of surface wave). Love waves travel with a lower velocity than P- or S- waves, but faster than Rayleigh waves. These waves are observed only when there is a low velocity layer overlying a high velocity layer/sub–layers.

The particle motion of a Love wave forms a horizontal line, perpendicular to the direction ofpropagation (i.e. aretransverse waves). Moving deeper into the material, motion can decrease to a "node" and then alternately increase and decrease as one examines deeper layers of particles. Theamplitude, or maximum particle motion, often decreases rapidly with depth.

Since Love waves travel on the Earth's surface, the strength (or amplitude) of the waves decrease exponentially with the depth of an earthquake. However, given their confinement to the surface, their amplitude decays only as${\displaystyle \frac{1}{\sqrt{r}}}$, where${\displaystyle r}$ represents the distance the wave has travelled from the earthquake. Surface waves therefore decay more slowly with distance than do body waves, which travel in three dimensions. Large earthquakes may generate Love waves that travel around the Earth several times before dissipating.

Since they decay so slowly, Love waves are the most destructive outside the immediate area of the focus orepicentre of an earthquake. They are what most people feel directly during an earthquake.

In the past, it was often thought that animals like cats and dogs could predict an earthquake before it happened. However, they are simply more sensitive toground vibrations than humans and are able to detect the subtler body waves that precede Love waves, like the P-waves and the S-waves.^[1]

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The conservation oflinear momentum of alinear elastic material can be written as^[2]

${\displaystyle \mathbf{\nabla }\cdot (\mathsf{C}:\mathbf{\nabla }\mathbf{u})=\rho \ddot{\mathbf{u}}}$

where${\displaystyle \mathbf{u}}$ is thedisplacement vector and${\displaystyle \mathsf{C}}$ is thestiffness tensor. Love waves are a special solution (${\displaystyle \mathbf{u}}$) that satisfy this system of equations. We typically use a Cartesian coordinate system (${\displaystyle x,y,z}$) to describe Love waves.

Consider an isotropic linear elastic medium in which the elastic properties are functions of only the${\displaystyle z}$ coordinate, i.e., theLamé parameters and the massdensity can be expressed as${\displaystyle \lambda (z),\mu (z),\rho (z)}$. Displacements${\displaystyle (u,v,w)}$ produced by Love waves as a function of time (${\displaystyle t}$) have the form

${\displaystyle u(x,y,z,t)=0,v(x,y,z,t)=\hat{v}(x,z,t),w(x,y,z,t)=0.}$

These are thereforeantiplane shear waves perpendicular to the${\displaystyle (x,z)}$ plane. The function${\displaystyle \hat{v}(x,z,t)}$ can be expressed as the superposition ofharmonic waves with varyingwave numbers (${\displaystyle k}$) andfrequencies (${\displaystyle \omega }$). Consider a single harmonic wave, i.e.,

${\displaystyle \hat{v}(x,z,t)=V(k,z,\omega )\exp [i(kx-\omega t)]}$

where${\displaystyle i}$ is theimaginary unit, i.e.${\displaystyle i^2=-1}$. Thestresses caused by these displacements are

${\displaystyle {\sigma }_{xx}=0,{\sigma }_{yy}=0,{\sigma }_{zz}=0,{\tau }_{zx}=0,{\tau }_{yz}=\mu (z)\frac{dV}{dz}\exp [i(kx-\omega t)],{\tau }_{xy}=ik\mu (z)V(k,z,\omega )\exp [i(kx-\omega t)].}$

If we substitute the assumed displacements into the equations for the conservation of momentum, we get a simplified equation

${\displaystyle \frac{d}{dz}\left[\mu (z)\frac{dV}{dz}\right]=[k^2\mu (z)-{\omega }^2\rho (z)]V(k,z,\omega ).}$

The boundary conditions for a Love wave are that thesurface tractions at the free surface${\displaystyle (z=0)}$ must be zero. Another requirement is that the stress component${\displaystyle {\tau }_{yz}}$ in a layer medium must be continuous at the interfaces of the layers. To convert the second orderdifferential equation in${\displaystyle V}$ into two first order equations, we express this stress component in the form

${\displaystyle {\tau }_{yz}=T(k,z,\omega )\exp [i(kx-\omega t)]}$

to get the first order conservation of momentum equations

The above equations describe aneigenvalue problem whose solutioneigenfunctions can be found by a number ofnumerical methods. Another common, and powerful, approach is thepropagator matrix method (also called thematricant approach).^{[citation needed]}

• Longitudinal wave
• Antiplane shear

• A. E. H. Love, "Some problems of geodynamics", first published in 1911 by the Cambridge University Press and published again in 1967 by Dover, New York, USA. (Chapter 11: Theory of the propagation of seismic waves)

• Geophysics
• Surface waves
• Seismology

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