Regional Variation of the ? Values in the Circum-Pacific Belt

A data set of earthquakes which occurred in the circum-Pacific regions has been used to compute the v values. This parameter is obtained through Gumbel’s third asymptotic distribution of extreme values and is well known as upper bound magnitude. The results show relatively higher v values in South America, Central America and Mexico, than in the western part of the circum-Pacific belt. The results are interpreted in terms of the different mechanical structure (heterogeneity) of the materials in the eastern and western parts of the examined area.