Noise-induced variability of volcanic extrusions

Department of Theoretical and Mathematical Physics, Laboratory of Multi-Scale Mathematical Modeling, Ural Federal University - Ekaterinburg, 620000, Russian Federation

Received: 28 October 2016
Accepted: 20 December 2016

Abstract

Motivated by important physical applications, we study a non-linear dynamics of volcanic extrusions on the basis of a simple pressure-mass flow model. We demonstrate that the deterministic phase portrait represents either the bulbous-type curves or closed paths stretched to their left depending on the initial conditions. The period of phase trajectories therewith increases when the pressure drop between the conduit top and bottom compensates the lava column pressure in it. Stochastic forcing changes the system dynamics drastically. We show that a repetitive scenario of volcanic behaviour with intermittency of stochastic oscillations of different extrusion amplitudes and frequencies appears in the presence of noises. As this takes place, the mean values of interspike intervals characterizing the system periodicity have a tendency to grow with increasing the noise intensity. The probability distribution functions confirming this dynamic behaviour are constructed.