Excessive water production is an enduring problem in the oil industry that has always been an unbearable burden on the environment and a great damage to the ultimate oil recovery. Gel treatment has been routinely used for decreasing water production. Disproportionate permeability reduction (DPR) is a natural phenomenon in some polymer gels that can reduce the permeability to water more than to oil. The conformance improvement treatments with DPR can effectively reduce the water cut without substantially reducing the oil productivity in fractured reservoirs. At present, there are no widely accepted mechanisms of oil-phase permeability development and DPR. In this paper, nuclear magnetic resonance is applied to study the mechanisms of oil-phase permeability development, DPR, and permeability influence by scanning different core samples treated with Cr­(III)–acetate–hydrolyzed polyacrylamide polymer gels. Results show that the permeability difference leads to a certain alteration in NMR T2 curves, but final conclusions for the mechanisms are consistent. For the mechanism of oil-phase permeability development, initially, gel displacement in large pores accounts for the oil permeability development, after which the gel dehydration becomes the main mechanism. The mechanisms for DPR include the blocking of flow channels by gel rehydration and residual oil and the low permeability of gel relative to water. The results can be used to optimize the utility of polymer gels with a DPR property.

The Caribbean plate subducts beneath northwest South America at a shallow angle due to a large igneous province that added up to 12 km of buoyant crust. The overriding plate lacks volcanism and exhibits Laramide‐style uplifts over 500 km from the trench. Here, we illuminate the subduction structures through finite frequency teleseismic P‐wave tomography and connect those structures to the Laramide‐style deformation on the overriding plate. We use a new data set collected from the Caribbean‐Mérida Andes seismic experiment comprised of 65 temporary broadband stations integrated with permanent stations from the Colombian and Venezuelan national networks. We identify three segments of subducting Caribbean plate with one segment completely detached from the surface. The timing of the detachment aligns with other regional events, including the uplift of the Mérida Andes, about 10 Ma. Slab buoyancy post‐detachment likely resulted in recoupling with the overriding plate, reactivation of Jurassic‐aged rift structures and subsequent uplift of the Mérida Andes. Mantle counterflow over the broken segment induced by rollback of the attached slab likely contributed to the uplift of the Mérida Andes. We conclude that the northern limit of subduction lies south of the Oca‐Ancón fault, though the fault itself may be the surface expression of the boundary. The southern limit of subduction lies south of our study area.

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Both seismic and geodetic data suggested that the ∼120‐km long Weifang segment of the Tanlu fault zone, a large‐scale active strike‐slip system at east China, is a seismic gap with no obvious along‐strike shear motion at surface. Measuring crustal deformation around the segment is crucial to constrain stress/strain buildup and potential seismic risk at the fault. We measured crustal and upper mantle seismic anisotropy using P‐to‐S converted waves at the Moho (Pms) and core‐mantle boundary (SKS) recorded by broadband arrays across the Weifang fault segment. The measured crustal anisotropy inside the fault zone shows a fast direction of ∼NNE, parallel to the fault orientation. Right east to the fault zone, the fast axis rotates by almost 90° to ESE. The crustal anisotropy within the fault zone could be caused by aligned microcracks and foliated minerals due to long‐lasting shear motion inside the fault zone.