Tectonics

The Solonker suture records the termination of the central Asian Orogenic Belt (CAOB). However, tectonic development of the Solonker suture is poorly understood. We report new field data for the Ondor Sum melange in the Ulan valley, and present a new evaluation of the orogenic belt extending from the southern Mongolia cratonic boundary to the north China craton within the context of a new geological framework and tectonic model, which incorporates relevant data from the literature. The southern accretionary zone between the north China craton and the Solonker suture is characterized by the Mid‐Ordovician‐Early Silurian Ulan island arc‐Ondor Sum subduction‐accretion complex and the Bainaimiao arc. This zone was consolidated by the Carboniferous‐Permian when it evolved into an Andean‐type magmatic margin above a south dipping subduction zone. The northern accretionary zone north of the Solonker suture extends southward from a Devonian to Carboniferous active continental margin, through the Hegenshan ophiolite‐arc accretionary complex to the Late Carboniferous Baolidao arc associated with some accreted Precambrian blocks. This northern zone had consolidated by the Permian when it developed into an Andean‐type magmatic margin above a north dipping subduction zone. Final subduction of the central Asian ocean caused the two opposing active continental margins to collide, leading to formation of the Solonker suture in the end‐Permian. Predominant northward subduction during final formation of the suture gave rise in the upper northern plate to a large‐scale, postcollisional, south directed thrust and fold belt in the Triassic‐Jurassic. In summary, the CAOB underwent three final stages of tectonic development: early Japanese‐type accretion, Andean‐type magmatism, and Himalayan‐type collision.

Previously proposed models for the evolution of the Tyrrhenian basin‐Apenninic arc system do not seem to satisfactorily explain the dynamic relationship between extension in the Tyrrhenian and compression in the Apennines. The most important regional plate kinematic constraints that any model has to satisfy in this case are: (1) the timing of extension in the Tyrrhenian and compression in the Apennines, (2) the amount of shortening in the Apennines, (3) the amount of extension in the Tyrrhenian, and (4) Africa‐Europe relative motion. The estimated contemporaneous (post‐middle Miocene) amounts of extension in the Tyrrhenian and of shortening in the Apennines appear to be very similar. The extension in the Tyrrhenian Sea is mostly accomplished in an E‐W direction, and cannot be straightforwardly related to the calculated N‐S Africa‐Europe convergence. A model of outward arc migration fits all these constraints. In a subducting system, the subduction zone is expected to migrate outward due to the sinking of the underthrusting plate into the mantle. The formation of a back‐arc or internal basin, i.e. of a basin internal to the surrounding belt of compression, (in this case the Tyrrhenian Sea) is then expected to take place if the motion of the overriding plate does not compensate for the retreat of the subduction zone. The sediment cover will be stripped from the underthrusting plate by the outward migrating arc of the overriding plate, and will accumulate to form an accretionary wedge. This accretionary body will grow outward in time, and will eventually become an orogenic belt, (in this case the present Apennines) when the migrating arc collides with the stable continental foreland on the subducting plate. An arc migration model satisfactorily accounts for the basic features of the Tyrrhenian‐Apennine system and for its evolution from 17 Ma to the present, and appears to be analogous to the tectonic evolution of other back‐arc settings both inside and outside the Mediterranean region. An interesting implication of the proposed accretionary origin of the Apennines is that the problematic “Argille Scagliose” (scaly clays) melange units might have been emplaced as overpressured mud diapirs, as observed in other accretionary prisms, and not by gravity slides from the internal zones.

Lithospheric extension is sited, preferentially, along orogenic belts because they have a thicker continental crust, contain structural inhomogeneities, and suffer extensional orogenic collapse caused by body forces resulting from isostatically compensated elevation and sharp elevation gradients. Collapse occurs especially where rapid advective thinning of the shortened thermal boundary conduction layer occurs beneath an orogen and causes rapid uplift. Where boundary forces are compressional, extension is balanced by radial thrusting to form oroclinal loops around collapsed extensional basins. Where, as in the disruption of Pangea, boundary forces change rapidly from compressional to tensional, body force collapse is continued by general extension which may lead to continental splitting. Even where overall convergence is continuing, orogenic collapse may be enhanced by subduction rollback into small remnant oceans. The extensional collapse of orogens offers a partial explanation for why oceans cyclically close and reopen in roughly the same places, preservation of very high pressure metamorphic rocks, for the return of orogenic large crustal thicknesses to normal without very much erosional denudation with the widespread preservation of supracrustal sequences, high temperature metamorphic assemblages and the minimum‐melting granite suite.

A number of tectonic events occurred contemporaneously in the Mediterranean region and the Middle East 30–25 Myr ago. These events are contemporaneous to or immediately followed a strong reduction of the northward absolute motion of Africa. Geological observations in the Neogene extensional basins of the Mediterranean region reveal that extension started synchronously from west to east 30–25 Myr ago. In the western Mediterranean it started in the Gulf of Lion, Valencia trough, and Alboran Sea as well as between the Maures massif and Corsica between 33 and 27 Ma ago. It then propagated eastward and southward to form to Liguro‐Provençal basin and the Tyrrhenian Sea. In the eastern Mediterranean, extension started in the Aegean Sea before the deposition of marine sediments onto the collapsed Hellenides in the Aquitanian and before the cooling of high‐temperature metamorphic core complexes between 20 and 25 Ma. Foundering of the inner zones of the Carpathians and extension in the Panonnian basin also started in the late Oligocene‐early Miocene. The body of the Afro‐Arabian plate first collided with Eurasia in the eastern Mediterranean region progressively from the Eocene to the Oligocene. Extensional tectonics was first recorded in the Gulf of Aden, Afar triple junction, and Red Sea region also in the Oligocene. A general magmatic surge occurred above all African hot spots, especially the Afar one. We explore the possibility that these drastic changes in the stress regime of the Mediterranean region and Middle East and the contemporaneous volcanic event were triggerred by the Africa/Arabia‐Eurasia collision, which slowed down the motion of Africa. The present‐day Mediterranean Sea was then locked between two collision zones, and the velocity of retreat of the African slab increased and became larger than the velocity of convergence leading to backarc extension. East of the Caucasus and northern Zagros collision zone the Afro‐Arabian plate was still pulled by the slab pull force in the Zagros subduction zone, which created extensional stresses in the northeast corner of the Afro‐Arabian plate. The Arabian plate was formed by propagation of a crack from the Carlsberg ridge westward toward the weak part of the African lithosphere above the Afar plume.

The western Mediterranean subduction zone (WMSZ) extends from the northern Apennine to southern Spain and turns around forming the narrow and tight Calabrian and Gibraltar Arcs. The evolution of the WMSZ is characterized by a first phase of orogenic wedging followed, from 30 Ma on, by trench retreat and back‐arc extension. Combining new and previous geological data, new tomographic images of the western Mediterranean mantle, and plate kinematics, we describe the evolution of the WMSZ during the last 35 Myr. Our reconstruction shows that the two arcs form by fragmentation of the 1500 km long WMSZ in small, narrow slabs. Once formed, these two narrow slabs retreat outward, producing back‐arc extension and large scale rotation of the flanks, shaping the arcs. The Gibraltar Arc first formed during the middle Miocene, while the Calabrian Arc formed later, during the late Miocene‐Pliocene. Despite the different paleogeographic settings, the mechanism of rupture and backward migration of the narrow slabs presents similarities on both sides of the western Mediterranean, suggesting that the slab deformation is also driven by lateral mantle flow that is particularly efficient in a restricted (upper mantle) style of mantle convection.

A new regional compilation of the drainage history in southeastern Tibet suggests that the modern rivers draining the plateau margin were once tributaries to a single, southward flowing system which drained into the South China Sea. Disruption of the paleo‐drainage occurred by river capture and reversal prior to or coeval with the initiation of Miocene (?) uplift in eastern Tibet, including ∼2000 m of surface uplift of the lower plateau margin since reversal of the flow direction of the Yangtze River. Despite lateral changes in course due to capture and reversal, the superposition of eastward and southward draining rivers that cross the southeastern plateau margin suggests that uplift has occurred over long wavelengths (>1000 km), mimicking the present low‐gradient topographic slope. Thus reorganization of drainage lines by capture and reversal events explains most of the peculiar patterns of the eastern plateau rivers, without having to appeal to large‐magnitude tectonic shear.

By combining reconstructions of the South American and African plates, the African and Antarctic plates, the Antarctic and Pacific plates, and the Pacific and Nazca plates, we calculated the relative positions and history of convergence of the Nazca and South American plates. Despite variations in convergence rates along the Andes, periods of rapid convergence (averaging more than 100 mm/a) between the times of anomalies 21 (49.5 Ma) and 18 (42 Ma) and since anomaly 7 (26 Ma) coincide with two phases of relatively intense tectonic activity in the Peruvian Andes, known as the late Eocene Incaic and Mio‐Pliocene Quechua phases. The periods of relatively slow convergence (50 to 55 ± 30 mm/a at the latitude of Peru and less farther south) between the times of anomalies 30–31 (68.5 Ma) and 21 and between those of anomalies 13 (36 Ma) and 7 correlate with periods during which tectonic activity was relatively quiescent. Thus these reconstructions provide quantitative evidence for a correlation of the intensity of tectonic activity in the overriding plate at subduction zones with variations in the convergence rate.

In recent years, the origin of the Betic‐Rif orocline has been the subject of considerable debate. Much of this debate has focused on mechanisms required to generate rapid late‐orogenic extension with coeval shortening. Here we summarize the principal geological and geophysical observations and propose a model for the Miocene evolution of the Betic‐Rif mountain belts, which is compatible with the evolution of the rest of the western Mediterranean. We regard palaeomagnetic data, which indicate that there have been large rotations about vertical axes, and earthquake data, which show that deep seismicity occurs beneath the Alboran Sea, to be the most significant data sets. Neither data set is satisfactorily accounted for by models which invoke convective removal or delamination of lithospheric mantle. Existing geological and geophysical observations are, however, entirely consistent with the existence of a subduction zone which rolled or peeled back until it collided with North Africa. We suggest that this ancient subducting slab consequently split into two fragments, one of which has continued to roll back, generating the Tyrrhenian Sea and forming the present‐day Calabrian Arc. The other slab fragment rolled back to the west, generating the Alboran Sea and the Betic‐Rif orocline during the early to middle Miocene.

The cause and geodynamic impact of flat subduction are investigated. First, the 1500 km long Peru flat slab segment is examined. Earthquake hypocenter data image two morphologic highs in the subducting Nazca Plate which correlate with the positions of subducted oceanic plateaus. Travel time tomographic images confirm the three‐dimensional slab geometry and suggest a lithospheric tear may bound the NW edge of the flat slab segment, with possible slab detachment occurring down dip as well. Other flat slab regions worldwide are discussed: central Chile, Ecuador, NW Colombia, Costa Rica, Mexico, southern Alaska, SW Japan, and western New Guinea. Flat subduction is shown to be a widespread phenomenon, occuring in 10% of modern convergent margins. In nearly all these cases, as a spatial and temporal correlation is observed between subducting oceanic plateaus and flat subduction, we conclude that flat subduction is caused primarily by (1) the buoyancy of thickened oceanic crust of moderate to young age and (2) a delay in the basalt to eclogite transition due to the cool thermal structure of two overlapping lithospheres. A statistical analysis of seismicity along the entire length of the Andes demonstrates that seismic energy release in the upper plate at a distance of 250–800 km from the trench is on average 3–5 times greater above flat slab segments than for adjacent steep slab segments. We propose this is due to higher interplate coupling and the cold, strong rheology of the overriding lithosphere which thus enables stress and deformation to be transmitted hundreds of kilometers into the heart of the upper plate.

Examination of five thrust belt systems developed at continental subduction boundaries suggests that they comprise two distinct groups that display pronounced and systematic differences in structural style, topographic elevation, denudation, metamorphism, postcollisional convergence, and foredeep basin geometry and facies. The distinctive geological features developed within each thrust belt group appear to be causally linked to the relative rates of subduction and convergence via the magnitude of horizontal compressional stress transmitted across the subduction boundary. At subduction boundaries where the rate of overall plate convergence is less than the rate of subduction (termed here retreating subduction boundaries) the transmission of horizontal compressive stress across the plate boundary is small, and regional deformation of the overriding plate is by horizontal extension. The tectonic expression of these retreating subduction boundaries includes topographically low mountains, little erosion or denudation, low‐grade to no metamorphism, little to no involvement of crystalline basement in shortening, little to no postcollisional convergence, anomalously deep foredeep basins, and a protracted history of flysch deposition within the adjacent foredeep basin. Analysis of deflection and gravity data across three retreating subduction boundaries (Apennine, Carpathian and Hellenic systems) shows that subduction is driven by gravitational forces acting on dense subducted slabs at depths between about 40 and 80 km (Carpathians), 50 and 150 km (Apennines) and 50 and 250 km (Hellenides). The total mass anomalies represented by the slabs are approximately 3×10¹², 6×10¹² and 12×10¹² N/m, respectively. The slabs are partially supported by flexural stresses transmitted through the subducted lithosphere to the foreland, and partially supported by dynamic (viscous) stresses in the asthenosphere. At subduction boundaries where the rate of overall plate convergence is greater than the rate of subduction (termed here advancing subduction boundaries) the transmission of horizontal compressive stress across the plate boundary is large, and regional deformation of the overriding plate is by horizontal shortening. The tectonic expression of these advancing subduction boundaries includes topographically high mountains, antithetic thrust belts, large amounts of erosion and denudation, exposure of high‐grade metamorphic rocks at the surface, extensive deformation of crystalline basement to midcrustal depths, protracted postcollisional convergence (tens of millions of years), and a protracted history of molasse deposition within the adjacent foredeep basins. Analysis of gravity and deflection data across two advancing subduction boundaries developed within the continental lithosphere (Western to Eastern and Southern Alps and Himalayas) shows that the thrust sheets have been translated for great distances over the foreland lithosphere (relative to the point at which the subduction forces are applied), thus obscuring any flexural and gravity signals from the subducted slab. However, it appears that far‐field stresses, presumably related to global plate motions, drive most of the convergent motion across these subduction boundaries. The concept that orogenic belts formed above retreating subduction boundaries have recognizable tectonic signatures that differ from those of orogenic belts formed above advancing subduction boundaries suggests that it may be possible to interpret the plate boundary settings in which ancient orogenic belts evolved.

Appendix B is available with entire article on microfiche.Order from the American Geophysical Union, 2000 FloridaAvenue, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20009. Document T92‐004; $2.50. Payment must accompany order.