scholarly journals Structural evolution of central Death Valley, California, using new thermochronometry of the Badwater turtleback

Lithosphere ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 436-447
Author(s):  
Travis Sizemore ◽  
Matthew M. Wielicki ◽  
Ibrahim Çemen ◽  
Daniel Stockli ◽  
Matthew Heizler ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Hanging Wall ◽  
Structural Evolution ◽  
Detachment Fault ◽  
Death Valley ◽  
Normal Faults ◽  
Owens Valley ◽  
Tectonic History ◽  
Brittle Ductile Transition ◽  
History Of ◽  
Copper Canyon

Abstract The Badwater turtleback, Copper Canyon turtleback, and Mormon Point turtleback are three anomalously smooth, ∼2-km-high basement structures in the Black Mountains of Death Valley, California. Their structural evolution is linked to the Cenozoic tectonic history of the region. To explore their evolution, we apply (U-Th)/He, Ar/Ar, and U-Pb analyses, with multi-domain diffusion modeling to 10 samples from the Badwater turtleback. The cooling history of the Badwater turtleback is used as a proxy for its exhumation history as it uplifted from warmer depths. We find slow (<2 °C/m.y.) cooling from ca. 32 to 6 Ma, followed by rapid (120–140 °C/m.y.) cooling from ca. 6 to 4.5 Ma, and finally moderate (30–120 °C/m.y.) cooling occurred from ca. 4.5 Ma until the present. When these data are added to previously published cooling paths of the Copper Canyon turtleback and Mormon Point turtleback, a northwest cooling pattern is broadly evident, consistent with a top-to-NW removal of the hanging wall along a detachment fault. We propose a six-phase tectonic history. Post-orogenic collapse and erosion dominated from ca. 32 to 16 Ma. At 16–14 Ma, a detachment fault formed with a breakaway south and east of the Black Mountains, with normal faults in the hanging wall. Moderate extension continued from 14 to 8 Ma causing exhumation of the turtlebacks through the brittle-ductile transition. Dextral transtension at 7–6 Ma produced a pull-apart basin across the Black Mountains with rapid extension. The locus of deformation transferred to the Panamint and Owens Valley fault systems from 4.5 to 3.5 Ma, slowing extension in the Black Mountains until present.

scholarly journals Late Cretaceous to Paleogene post-obduction extension and subsequent Neogene compression in the Oman Mountains

GeoArabia ◽  
2006 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 17-40 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marc Fournier ◽  
Claude Lepvrier ◽  
Philippe Razin ◽  
Laurent Jolivet
Keyword(s):  
Late Cretaceous ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Early Miocene ◽  
Normal Faults ◽  
Zagros Mountains ◽  
Lower Eocene ◽  
Oman Mountains ◽  
Tectonic History ◽  
History Of ◽  
Arabian Platform

ABSTRACT After the obduction of the Semail ophiolitic nappe onto the Arabian Platform in the Late Cretaceous, north Oman underwent several phases of extension before being affected by compression in the framework of the Arabia-Eurasia convergence. A tectonic survey, based on structural analysis of fault-slip data in the post-nappe units of the Oman Mountains, allowed us to identify major events of the Late Cretaceous and Cenozoic tectonic history of northern Oman. An early ENE-WSW extensional phase is indicated by synsedimentary normal faults in the Upper Cretaceous to lower Eocene formations. This extensional phase, which immediately followed ductile extension and exhumation of high-pressure rocks in the Saih Hatat region of the Oman Mountains, is associated with large-scale normal faulting in the northeast Oman margin and the development of the Abat Basin. A second extensional phase, recorded in lower Oligocene formations and only documented by minor structures, is characterized by NNE (N20°E) and NW (N150°E) oriented extensions. It is interpreted as the far-field effect of the Oligocene-Miocene rifting in the Gulf of Aden. A late E-W to NE-SW directed compressional phase started in the late Oligocene or early Miocene, shortly after the collision in the Zagros Mountains. It is attested by folding, and strike-slip and reverse faulting in the Cenozoic series. The direction of compression changed from ENE-WSW in the Early Miocene to almost N-S in the Pliocene.

STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS OF THE WICHITA UPLIFT AND STRUCTURES IN THE ANADARKO BASIN, SOUTHERN OKLAHOMA

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-51 ◽  
Author(s):  
Molly Turko ◽  
Shankar Mitra
Keyword(s):  
Normal Faults ◽  
Anadarko Basin ◽  
Tectonic History ◽  
Arbuckle Group ◽  
Southern Oklahoma ◽  
Northwestern Margin ◽  
History Of ◽  
Regional Stresses ◽  
Surface Geology ◽  
2D And 3D

We have constructed regional structural transects across the Wichita Uplift and adjacent Anadarko Basin to show the relationship between thick-skinned basement-involved structures and thin-skinned detached fold-thrust structures. Slip from the basement-involved structures in the Wichita Uplift is transferred along two major detachments into the Anadarko Basin. Our interpretation is that along the northwestern margin, the Wichita Uplift is marked by a zone of frontal imbricates forming a triangular wedge with most of the slip dissipated along the Wichita front. Paleozoic units show tight folding with overturned beds in the frontal zone. The uplift is episodic as indicated by the truncation of major faults along unconformities and their subsequent reactivation. In contrast, along the southeast margin, a significant part of the slip is transferred into structures in the Anadarko Basin. These structures are tight faulted-detachment folds that formed above a major detachment within the Springer Shale, cored by broader structures detaching at the base of the Arbuckle Group. Examples include the Carter-Knox, Cement-Chickasha, and Cruce structures. Oblique faults with normal and strike-slip components cut some of these structures, resulting in more complex geometries. We propose that pre-existing normal faults of Precambrian-Cambrian age were either reactivated along the Wichita Uplift, or controlled the location of the Pennsylvanian age structures in the Anadarko Basin. Progressive rotation of regional stresses from northeast-southwest to a more east-northeast-west-southwest direction during the Pennsylvanian impacted the tectonic history of the area. We used 2D and 3D seismic, well log data, and surface geology were used to evaluate the structural styles and tectonic evolution of the Wichita Uplift and the Anadarko Basin.

Quantitative analysis of fault and fold growth in a salt-bearing transtensional basins: the Sørvestsnaget Basin, Western Barents Sea

2020 ◽  
pp. SP495-2020-123
Author(s):  
Thomas B. Kristensen ◽  
Atle Rotevatn ◽  
Maria Marvik ◽  
Gijs A. Henstra ◽  
Rob L. Gawthorpe ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Barents Sea ◽  
Hanging Wall ◽  
Structural Evolution ◽  
Normal Fault ◽  
Growth Patterns ◽  
Hydrocarbon Exploration ◽  
Normal Faults ◽  
Lateral Migration ◽  
Seismic Reflection Data ◽  
Economic Implications

AbstractThe growth of faults and folds in basins formed under transtension has been less studied than in their extensional counterparts. In this study, we capitalise on 3D seismic reflection data to investigate the evolution of faults and folds that evolved coevally during sub-orthogonal partitioned extension and shortening, respectively, in the Sørvestsnaget Basin, Western Barents Sea. We use quantitative techniques to constrain the distribution of normal fault throw, shortening accommodated by folds and thrusts, and stratigraphic thickness variations, to analyse the relative temporal and spatial evolution of faults and folds. Our results show that normal faults display a similar evolution to those occurring in extensional basins, where they grew by lateral- and dip-linkage of individual fault segments as well as upward propagation. Notably, we show that shortening-related fold growth affected the fault growth patterns, skewing their throw distributions, and shifting the location of accommodation away from the evolving folds. Thus, fold amplification caused lateral migration of normal fault hanging-wall depocentres. Our results shed new light on fault and fold growth processes in transtensional basins and contributes to an improved understanding of the structural evolution of basins forming along sheared continental margins, which has economic implications for sheared-margin basins targeted for hydrocarbon exploration.

Tectonic history of the Queen Charlotte Islands and adjacent areas—a model

1981 ◽  
Vol 18 (11) ◽  
pp. 1717-1739 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. J. Yorath ◽  
R. L. Chase
Keyword(s):  
Fault Zone ◽  
Upper Jurassic ◽  
Normal Faults ◽  
Queen Charlotte Islands ◽  
Tectonic History ◽  
History Of ◽  
Middle Component ◽  
High Level ◽  
Paleozoic Rocks ◽  
Alexander Terrane

The region including Queen Charlotte Islands, Hecate Strait, and Queen Charlotte Sound is underlain by two allochthonous terranes, Wrangellia and the Alexander terrane. The suture between them occurs in central Graham Island and central Hecate Strait and is coincident with the traces of the Sandspit and Rennell Sound fault zones, each of which developed in response to crustal rifting in Queen Charlotte Sound during mid-Tertiary time.The stratigraphic succession comprises four tectonic assemblages. (1) The allochthonous assemblages comprise Paleozoic rocks of the Alexander terrane and Upper Triassic and Jurassic rocks of Wrangellia, which on the basis of paleomagnetic and biogeographical data are clearly exotic. The distribution of these terranes beneath Queen Charlotte Sound and Hecate Strait is supported by geophysical information and subsurface data obtained from offshore wells. (2) The suture assemblage is represented by extremely coarse conglomerates, massive graywackes, and turbidites of Early Cretaceous age, and possibly by Upper Jurassic plutons. (3) The post-suture assemblage is expressed by the tripartite succession of the mid- to Upper Cretaceous Queen Charlotte Group whose middle component, the Honna Formation, comprises polymictic conglomerates that may have resulted from the final accretion of the amalgamated crustal fragments of the Alexander Terrane and Wrangellia to the continental margin. (4) The rift assemblage is expressed by mid- to upper Tertiary volcanics, epizonal plutons, and terrigenous clastics. Rifting is believed to have occurred in Queen Charlotte Sound above a mantle plume and resulted in crustal attenuation through development of listric, crustal-penetrative normal faults, and concurrent extrusion of subaerial volcanics and emplacement of high-level plutons. The attenuation caused northward motion of the Queen Charlotte Islands along the Louscoone Inlet – Sandspit fault zone and subsidence in Queen Charlotte Sound where Lower Miocene marine sediments were deposited within the rift zone. Later, additional rifting in southern Hecate Strait resulted in the reactivation of the old suture zone, manifest as the Rennell Sound fault zone. Concurrent with continued terrigenous deposition and volcanism, the Queen Charlotte Islands moved northwesterly along the Rennell Sound Fault, which disrupted the earlier fault trend. The final rotation of the islands to their modern position was accomplished through left-lateral motion along the Beresford Bay and Langara Faults.

scholarly journals Evolution of ancient Lake Ohrid: a tectonic perspective

2010 ◽  
Vol 7 (10) ◽  
pp. 3377-3386 ◽  
Author(s):  
N. Hoffmann ◽  
K. Reicherter ◽  
T. Fernández-Steeger ◽  
C. Grützner
Keyword(s):  
Hydrothermal Activity ◽  
Normal Faults ◽  
Lake Ohrid ◽  
Tectonic History ◽  
Neogene Sediments ◽  
History Of ◽  
Basin Formation ◽  
Hazard Level ◽  
Yugoslavian Republic ◽  
Tectonic Features

Abstract. Lake Ohrid Basin is a graben structure situated in the Dinarides at the border of the Former Yugoslavian Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) and Albania. It hosts one of the oldest lakes in Europe and is characterized by a basin and range-like geological setting together with the halfgraben basins of Korca, Erseka and Debar. The basin is surrounded by Paleozoic metamorphics in the northeast and north and Mesozoic ultramafic, carbonatic and magmatic rocks in the east, northwest, west and south. Paleocene to Pliocene units are present in the southwest. With the basin development, Neogene sediments from Pliocene to recent deposited in the lows. There are three major deformation phases: (A) NW–SE shortening from Late Cretaceous to Miocene; (B) uplift and diminishing compression during Messinian – Pliocene; (C) vertical uplift and (N)E–(S)W extension from Pliocene to recent led to the basin formation. Neotectonic activity of the study area concentrates on N–S trending normal faults that bound the Ohrid Basin eastwards and westwards. Seismic activity with moderate to strong events is documented during the last 2000 yrs; the seismic hazard level is among the highest in Albania and Macedonia. Activity of the youngest faults is evidenced by earthquake data and field observations. Morphotectonic features like fault scarps, a stepped series of active normal faults, deformed paleosols, a wind gap and fault-related hydrothermal activity are preserved around Lake Ohrid and allow delineating the tectonic history. It is shown that the Lake Ohrid Basin can be characterized as a seismogenic landscape. This paper presents a tectonic history of the Lake Ohrid Basin and describes tectonic features that are preserved in the recent landscape. The analysis of morphotectonic features is used to derive the deformation history. The stratigraphy of the area is summarized and concentrates on the main units.

scholarly journals Analysis of Palaeogene strike-slip tectonics along the southern East Greenland margin (Sødalen area)

1969 ◽  
Vol 23 ◽  
pp. 65-68 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pierpaolo Guarnieri
Keyword(s):  
Structural Data ◽  
Field Work ◽  
Strike Slip ◽  
Normal Faults ◽  
Large Area ◽  
East Greenland ◽  
Tectonic History ◽  
History Of ◽  
Host Rocks ◽  
Greenland Margin

This paper describes structural data collected during field work in southern East Greenland, a region characterised by a complex tectonic history. Here, 3D photogeology based on aerial and oblique photographs using high-resolution photogrammetry of a 150 km2 area in Sødalen in southern East Greenland shows ESE–WNW-trending faults cross-cutting Paleocene rift structures and flexure-related normal faults. The kinematic analysis highlights oblique and left-lateral strike-slip movements along faults oriented 120°. Strike-slip and dip-slip kinematic indicators on the walls of the chilled contacts between alkaline E–W-oriented dykes and the volcanic host rocks suggest that the faults and dykes formed at the same time, or maybe the faults were re-activated at a later stage. Palaeostress analysis, performed by inversion of fault-slip data, shows the presence of three different tectonic events. Coupling the 3D photogeological tool with structural analysis at key localities is a fundamental way to understand better the tectonic history of such a large area.

Taconian and Acadian transpression between the internal Humber Zone and the Gaspé Belt in the Gaspé Peninsula: tectonic history of the Shickshock Sud fault zone

2004 ◽  
Vol 41 (5) ◽  
pp. 635-653 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul E Sacks ◽  
Michel Malo ◽  
Walter E Trzcienski, Jr ◽  
Alix Pincivy ◽  
Patrice Gosselin
Keyword(s):  
Hanging Wall ◽  
Shear Bands ◽  
Shear Zones ◽  
Strike Slip ◽  
Tectonic History ◽  
Movement Kinematic ◽  
Deformation Features ◽  
History Of ◽  
Laurentian Margin ◽  
Strike Slip Movement

The Shickshock Sud fault has a history of Ordovician (Taconian), Silurian (Salinic), and Devonian (Acadian) movements. Taconian deformation involving ductile dextral oblique-slip faulting is recorded in Cambrian rocks in the footwall of the Shickshock Sud fault. Metabasalt and metaarkose at amphibolite grade are converted into phyllonite and mylonitic schist. Shear bands, asymmetric garnet porphyroclasts, C–S fabrics, and mica-fish textures indicate dextral shearing. The regional sense of shear is top to west and southwest on generally southeast dipping shear zones. Hornblende of metabasalt yielded an 40Ar/39Ar age of 455.9 ± 2 Ma, and muscovite from the mylonitic schist yielded an 40Ar/39Ar age of 454.3 ± 0.9 Ma, which indicate metamorphism and deformation during the Taconian orogeny. Evidence for Silurian activity is indicated by the Salinic unconformity to the south related to normal block-faulting. Deformation features in the Ordovician and Silurian–Devonian rocks in the hanging wall were predominantly brittle and involved dextral transpression. Kinematic indicators point to predominantly dextral strike-slip movement. Kinematic analysis of brittle fault-slip data indicates that the shortening axis direction during strike-slip deformation was northwest–southeast and subhorizontal, which is essentially coaxial to the average pole of Acadian cleavage. Deformation in the hanging wall of the Shickshock Sud fault is Acadian-related. The irregular geometry of the Laurentian margin, including the Grenville basement, might be the cause for Taconian and Acadian transpression in the Gaspé Appalachians.

scholarly journals From widespread Mississippian to localized Pennsylvanian extension in central Spitsbergen, Svalbard

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jean-Baptiste P. Koehl ◽  
Jhon M. Munoz-Barrera
Keyword(s):  
Hanging Wall ◽  
Sedimentary Rocks ◽  
Normal Faults ◽  
Growth Strata ◽  
Initiation Phase ◽  
Tectonic Events ◽  
Basement Rocks ◽  
Field Evidence ◽  
Major Fault ◽  
History Of

Abstract. In the Devonian–Carboniferous, a rapid succession of clustered extensional and contractional tectonic events is thought to have affected sedimentary rocks in central Spitsbergen. These events include Caledonian post-orogenic extensional collapse associated with the formation of thick Early–Middle Devonian basins, Late Devonian–Mississippian Ellesmerian contraction, and Early–Middle Pennsylvanian rifting, which resulted in the deposition of thick sedimentary units in Carboniferous basins like the Billefjorden Trough. The clustering of these varied tectonic settings makes it sometimes difficult to resolve the tectono-sedimentary history of individual stratigraphic units. Notably, the context of deposition of Mississippian clastic and coal-bearing sedimentary rocks of the Billefjorden Group is still debated, especially in central Spitsbergen. We present field evidence from the northern part of the Billefjorden Trough, in Odellfjellet (Austfjorden), suggesting that tilted Mississippian sedimentary strata of the Billefjorden Group deposited during active (Late/latest?) Mississippian extension. Evidence include slickenside lineations and growth strata in the hanging wall of basin-oblique NNE-dipping faults, such as the Overgangshytta fault. These basin-oblique faults systematically die out upwards within Mississippian to lowermost Pennsylvanian strata and suggest a period of widespread WNW–ESE-directed extension in the Mississippian (rift “initiation” phase), followed by an episode of more localized extension in Early–Middle Pennsylvanian times (“interaction and linkage” and “through-going fault” phases). In addition, the presence of abundant basin-oblique faults parallel to the Overgangshytta fault in basement rocks adjacent to the Billefjorden Trough suggests that the formation of Mississippian normal faults was partly controlled by reactivation of preexisting Neoproterozoic (Timanian?) basement-seated fault zones. We propose that these existing faults reactivated as transverse fault or accommodation cross faults in or near the crest of transverse folds reflecting differential displacement along the Billefjorden Fault Zone, thus suggesting that normal faulting along this major fault initiated as early as the Mississippian. In Cenozoic times, the Overgangshytta fault may have mildly reactivated as an oblique thrust during transpression–contraction, and shallow-dipping bedding-parallel duplex-shaped decollements in shales of the Billefjorden Group possibly prevented further movement along Mississippian margin-oblique faults.

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