The phrase "explain the cause" is correct and usable in written English.
You can use it when you want someone to describe the reason for something. For example, "Please explain the cause of the traffic accident."
We analyzed pertussis reporting, death, hospitalization, and serodiagnostic data from 1976 to 1998 to help explain the cause of the 1996 pertussis outbreak in the Netherlands.
The magistrate did not explain the cause of death.
Quite how forcefully such interests may have made their case could explain the cause of the crash.
De Silva did not explain the cause of death but declared the mass grave a crime scene.
Investigators and survivors rely on the data collection boxes to reconstruct air accidents and help explain the cause of a plane crash.
Although the state media did not fully explain the cause of the unrest, residents cited the plan to move the government offices.
In the course of this investigation, many observations have been made that help to explain the cause and provide approaches to the control of many diseases.
Mr. Grembam, who is also associated with CalCars, could not explain the cause of the fire, which had occurred while the vehicle was being charged.
Also codified in thirteenth-century England was the writ of habeas corpus, an order requiring a jailer to bring a prisoner before a court and explain the cause of his imprisonment.
Galtung, although his own granddaughter narrowly escaped the shooting, unflinchingly applied his sociologist's method of "diagnosis, prognosis and treatment" in an attempt to explain the cause of the violence.
The title of "Margaret" comes from an 1880 poem by Gerard Manley Hopkins, "Spring and Fall," which is addressed to a child who cannot explain the cause of the tears she sheds at the sight of dying leaves in autumn.
