Underlining new ways to predict earthquakes in future, a study by the US researchers has noted that powerful earthquakes have the potential to prompt weakening geologic faults even half the world away!

The study, published in the journal Nature, said that the powerful earthquake in Sumatra, Indonesia, in 2004 has possibly weakened California's San Andreas fault, which is nearly 8,000km away from Sumatra.

The findings by the scientists, led by earthquake researcher Taka'aki Taira of the University of California Berkeley, were based on a two-decade-long analysis of seismic data from the Parkfield area of the San Andreas fault.

Saying that the research team intends collecting data from other fault zones to observe if the pattern of changes is similar to the San Andreas, Taira remarked: "We speculate that changes we see at Parkfield could be happening in many places in the world."

Further adding that the detection of a similarity in pattern could form the basis of forecasting earthquakes in the future, Taira explained that earthquakes occur when a fault fails, either due to the upsurge in stress or due to a weakening of the fault.

However, noting that it is comparatively more difficult to gauge changes in fault strength than changes in stress, more so for faults deep in the Earth's crust, Taira said the study signals "exciting possibilities for monitoring seismic risk and understanding the causes of earthquakes."