This repository reproduces code for poly3d, a boundary element method program first released in the M.S. thesis Thomas, 1993. It is intended to make this legacy code easily available for use in structural geology, geomechanics, and active tectonics research.
A C++ patch that parallelizes parts of poly3d using OpenMPI and Elemental is available for beta testing. This version, called poly3d_parallel, can currently handle complex fault models with more than 25K elements in around 18 hours using two nodes with dual 2.2GHz, 16-core CPUs. Fault models that would take a week or more to run on a high-performance computer can be run in a reasonable amount of time on a cluster. Please get in touch if you are interested in using poly3d_parallel as part of an academic project.
poly3d needs
- Unit tests
- Further parallelization
- A rewrite using an object-oriented framework
Traditionally, poly3d has been used in regional studies employing relatively coarse fault meshes. If you use the original or parallel version successfully with a complex model with nearly intersecting faults or a fine mesh, please consider sharing your input file as a test for future releases.
Likewise, feel free to fork this repository to parallelize or rewrite other subroutines.
The primary poly3d manual is Thomas, 1993. It covers the details of the boundary value problems behind poly3d and explains the input and output file formats.
Prof. Michele Cooke (University of Massachussetts, Amherst) maintains a poly3d tutorial page that previously included the thesis source code provided here. The original poly3d tutorial is available there, as are several examples and other software packages. Other examples are available on the Stanford Structural Geology and Geomechanics website.
The makefile provided here assumes you are using a recent version of gcc, the GNU Compiler Collection. Mac OS X 10.8 and above alias gcc to a clang front-end; to compile poly3d in those environments, you must install gcc using Homebrew or macports. This version of poly3d is tested and modified under Debian Linux and CentOS using gcc 4.8.
Both versions of poly3d must be compiled with the -O2 flag. Over-optimization (e.g. -O3 or -ffast-math) can lead to unpredictable numerical errors and large singularities in the resulting displacement fields. Just say no!
poly3d -i <input> -o <output>
poly3d and a related commercial software package were developed by researchers and students of Profs. David Pollard and Atilla Aydin associated with the Stanford Rock Fracture Project and the Structural Geology and Geomechanics research group. This repository is intended for academic use only, and is solely derived from the publicly available source code printed in Thomas, 1993 with modifications to fix the "shadow effect."
Please cite this thesis and related publications if you use poly3d in published work.
Thomas, A. L., 1993, Poly3D: A three-dimensional, polygonal element, displacement discontinuity boundary element computer program with applications to fractures, faults, and cavities in the Earth's crust (Doctoral dissertation, Stanford University).
To see a recent example of poly3d in action, take a look at this 2014 paper by Fattaruso, Cooke, and Dorsey on uplift produced by tectonic activity in the Coachella area.
Additional references to come.
Questions? Comments? Complaints?
Robert Sare [email protected]
STGL