Matías Clunes , John Browning, Carlos Marquardt, Jorge Cortez, Kyriaki Drymoni, Janine Lynsey Kavanagh

Constraints on the amount and pattern of ground deformation induced by dike emplacement are important for assessing potential eruptions. The vast majority of ground deformation inversions made for volcano monitoring during volcanic unrest assume that dikes are emplaced in either an elastic-half space (a homogeneous crust) or a crust made of horizontal layers with different mechanical properties. Here, we extend these models by designing a novel set of two-dimensional Finite Element Method numerical simulations that consider dike induced surface deformations related to a mechanically heterogeneous crust with inclined layers, thus modelling a common geometry in stratovolcanoes and crustal segments that have been folded by tectonic forces. Our results confirm that layer inclination can produce localized ground deformations which may be up to 30 times higher in terms of deformation magnitude than would be expected in a purely homogeneous model, depending on the angle of inclination and the stiffness of the rock units that host and are close to the dike, generating asymmetrical deformation patterns with peaks located as much as 1.4 km away from the expected in the homogeneous model. These results highlight the necessity to accurately quantify both the mechanical properties and attitude of the geology underlying active volcanoes.