title: Stabilizing stick-slip friction.
abstract: Even the most regular stick-slip frictional sliding is always stochastic, with irregularity in both the intervals between slip events and the sizes of the associated stress drops. Applying small-amplitude oscillations to the shear force, we show, experimentally and theoretically, that the stick-slip periods synchronize. We further show that this phase locking is related to the inhibition of slow rupture modes which forces a transition to fast rupture, providing a possible mechanism for observed remote triggering of earthquakes. Such manipulation of collective modes may be generally relevant to extended nonlinear systems driven near to criticality.
authors.affiliation: School of Chemistry, Tel Aviv University, 69978 Tel Aviv, Israel.
authors.forename: Rosario
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Capozza
authors.forename: Shmuel M
authors.initials: SM
authors.lastname: Rubinstein
authors.forename: Itay
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Barel
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Urbakh
authors.forename: Jay
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Fineberg