Seismic anisotropy, the directional dependency of seismic wave velocities, is important for mapping the Earth’s structure and understanding geodynamic processes. Seismic anisotropy primarily stems from the development of mineral crystallographic preferred orientation (i.e. texture) during the plastic deformation of rocks. In-depth analysis of data from texture characterization techniques like Electron Backscatter Diffraction (EBSD) enables the determination of mineral and bulk-rock elastic properties. Although the influences of pressure, temperature, and melt on elastic properties and seismic anisotropy is well understood, they are often disregarded. To help address this gap, we developed SAnTex: Seismic Anisotropy from Texture, an open-source Python library that calculates the full elastic tensor of rocks from modal mineral composition, crystallographic orientation, and a crystal stiffness tensor catalogue that accounts for the dependency of elasticity with pressure, temperature and melt. The elastic wave velocities (, ) and seismic anisotropy are calculated from the full elastic tensors. SAnTex extends its utility beyond the solidus by estimating melt volume in a rock and assessing its impact on seismic wave velocities and anisotropy.
Singh, U., Özaydın, S., Chatzaras, V. and Rey, P., 2025. SAnTex: A Python-based Library for Seismic Anisotropy Calculation. Journal of Open Source Software, 10(110), p.6886.
