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1.
Understanding the relationship between sedimentation and tectonics is critical to the analysis of stratigraphic evolution in foreland basins. Previous models of foreland basins have explained stratal development, but were done generally under the assumption that steady allogenic forcing produces a steady stratigraphic response. They did not consider autogenic shoreline behaviour during the development of the subsidence pattern characteristic of foreland basins. We present a mathematical model and flume experiments that explore how subsidence and sediment‐supply rates control the shoreline trajectory and the stratal patterns that fill foreland basins. Through these models, we found differing autogenic responses in the rate and direction of shoreline migration, and these generated three distinct styles of stratal architecture, despite the constant external forcing (i.e. constant sediment discharge and basin substrate tilting). The first response was ‘autoretreat’, where shoreline migration switched from initial progradation to retrogradation. The second response was progradation followed by constant aggradation of the shoreline. The third response was maintained progradation with a markedly accelerating rate. We termed this latter newly observed autogenic behaviour ‘shoreline autoacceleration’. These three modes of shoreline behaviour and their accompanying stratal architecture provide a basic framework for the relationship between sedimentation and tectonic activity in foreland basins under the simplified conditions presented here.  相似文献   

2.
Excellent exposure, well-controlled palaeobathymetry, and tightly-spaced, high-precision radiometric age control in the El Gallo Fm. permit rigorous quantitative analysis. Backstripping of these proximal nonmarine, forearc basin deposits reveals that, during the Late Cretaceous, the Rosario embayment of the Peninsular Ranges forearc was undergoing an episode of rapid tectonic subsidence. This subsidence had several marked effects on the sedimentology of the Rosario embayment: formation of a broad alluvial plain consisting of coarse-grained clastics; rapid (∼ 600 m Myr-1) aggradation of sediments; and a retrogradational succession of facies, capped by a marine transgression, as deposition failed to keep pace with eustatic rise and subsidence.
Long-term sedimentation is driven by some combination of two allocyclic mechanisms: tectonic subsidence and eustatic sea-level rise. In order to evaluate which force predominated during deposition of the El Gallo Fm., the processes of sedimentation, compaction, and isostasy are evaluated through the interval in question. A sensitivity analysis is performed, in which the maximum tectonic and maximum eustatic contributions are estimated, along with the best-fit model. These results are qualitatively the same: tectonic subsidence was the major driving force of sedimentation in the Rosario embayment in late Campanian time. Regional sedimentological similarities suggest that this tectonic subsidence may have characterized the Peninsular Ranges forearc margin at this time, reflecting an episode of active down-faulting during the Late Cretaceous.  相似文献   

3.
Mantle-induced dynamic topography (i.e., subsidence and uplift) has been increasingly recognized as an important process in foreland basin development. However, characterizing and distinguishing the effects (i.e., location, extent and magnitude) of dynamic topography in ancient foreland basins remains challenging because the spatio-temporal footprint of dynamic topography and flexural topography (i.e., generated by topographic loading) can overlap. This study employs 3D flexural backstripping of Upper Cretaceous strata in the central part of the North American Cordilleran foreland basin (CFB) to better quantify the effects of dynamic topography. The extensive stratigraphic database and good age control of the CFB permit the regional application of 3D flexural backstripping in this basin for the first time. Dynamic topography started to influence the development of the CFB during the late Turonian to middle Campanian (90.2–80.2 Ma) and became the dominant subsidence mechanism during the middle to late Campanian (80.2–74.6 Ma). The area influenced by >100 m dynamic subsidence is approximately 400 by 500 km, within which significant (>200 m) dynamic subsidence occurs in an irregular-shaped (i.e., lunate) subregion. The maximum magnitude of dynamic subsidence is 300 ± 100 m based on the 80.2–74.6 Ma tectonic subsidence maps. With the maximum magnitude of dynamic uplift being constrained to be 200–300 m, the gross amount of dynamic topography in the Late Cretaceous CFB is 500–600 m. Although the location of dynamic subsidence revealed by tectonic subsidence maps is generally consistent with isopach map trends, tectonic subsidence maps developed through 3D flexural backstripping provide more accurate constraints of the areal extent, magnitude and rate of dynamic topography (as well as flexural topography) in the CFB through the Late Cretaceous. This improved understanding of dynamic topography in the CFB is critical for refining current geodynamic models of foreland basins and understanding the surface expression of mantle processes.  相似文献   

4.
A numerical model linking a coral growth algorithm and an algorithm for flexural subsidence reproduces many of the characteristics of drowned foreland basin carbonate platforms. This model successfully matches the observed distribution and drowning age of drowned carbonate platforms in the Huon Gulf, Papua New Guinea, a modern submarine foreland basin. Analysis of equations describing flexural subsidence and eustatic sea-level variations suggest that there are minimum convergence rates and periodicities of sea-level variation required to drown foreland basin carbonate platforms. For convergence rates on the order of a few millimetres per year, sea-level must vary on time-scales of about 105 years in order to induce a rate of relative sea-level rise great enough to drown an otherwise healthy foreland basin carbonate platform.  相似文献   

5.
The James Ross Basin, in the northern Antarctic Peninsula, exposes which is probably the world thickest and most complete Late Cretaceous sedimentary succession of southern high latitudes. Despite its very good exposures and varied and abundant fossil fauna, precise chronological determination of its infill is still lacking. We report results from a magnetostratigraphic study on shelfal sedimentary rocks of the Marambio Group, southeastern James Ross Basin, Antarctica. The succession studied covers a ~1,200 m‐thick stratigraphic interval within the Hamilton Point, Sanctuary Cliffs and Karlsen Cliffs Members of the Snow Hill Island Formation, the Haslum Crag Formation, and the lower López de Bertodano Formation. The basic chronological reference framework is given by ammonite assemblages, which indicate a Late Campanian – Early Maastrichtian age for the studied units. Magnetostratigraphic samples were obtained from five partial sections located on James Ross and Snow Hill islands, the results from which agree partially with this previous biostratigraphical framework. Seven geomagnetic polarity reversals are identified in this work, allowing to identify the Chron C32/C33 boundary in Ammonite Assemblage 8‐1, confirming the Late Campanian age of the Hamilton Point Member. However, the identification of the Chron C32/C31 boundary in Ammonite Assemblage 8‐2 assigns the base of the Sanctuary Cliffs Member to the early Maastrichtian, which differs from the Late Campanian age previously assigned by ammonite biostratigraphy. This magnetostratigraphy spans ~14 Ma of sedimentary succession and together with previous partial magnetostratigraphies on Early‐Mid Campanian and Middle Maastrichtian to Danian columns permits a complete and continuous record of the Late Cretaceous distal deposits of the James Ross Basin. This provides the required chronological resolution to solve the intra‐basin and global correlation problems of the Late Cretaceous in the Southern Hemisphere in general and in the Weddellian province in particular, given by endemism and diachronic extinctions on invertebrate fossils, including ammonites. The new chronostratigraphic scheme allowed us to calculate sediment accumulation rates for almost the entire Late Cretaceous infill of the distal James Ross Basin (the Marambio Group), showing a monotonous accumulation for more than 8 Myr during the upper Campanian and a dramatic increase during the early Maastrichtian, controlled by tectonic and/or eustatic causes.  相似文献   

6.
Facies distributions, stratal geometry and regional erosional bevelling surfaces in Upper Cretaceous (Cenomanian-Santonian) strata of the Alberta foreland basin are interpreted in terms of high-frequency (probably eustatic) relative changes in sea level, superimposed on longer-term basin-floor warping, related to episodic tectonic loading. Thick marine shales correspond to periods of rapid subsidence whereas thin but extensive strandplain sandstones record rapid progradation during slow subsidence. Westward-thickening wedges of coastal plain strata were deposited during initial downwarping of a near-horizontal strandplain, prior to marine transgression. Surfaces of erosional bevelling beneath which between 40 and >160m of strata have been removed extend at least 300 km from the present deformation front and are interpreted to reflect forebulge uplift in the east. Uplift appears to have lagged about 0.25-0.5 Myr behind the onset of accelerated loading. Thin marine sandstones which grade westward into mudstone are interpreted as material winnowed from the crest of the rising forebulge. Subsidence and/or westward migration of the forebulge allowed the sea to flood westward across the eastern flank of the eroded forebulge. The transgressive shoreface cut asymmetric notches which were later blanketed by marine shales which lap out from east to west. The two unconformities which embody the largest erosional vacuity are veneered locally with oolitic ironstone which accumulated in a shallow, sediment-starved setting on the crest of the forebulge. The consistent pattern of erosional bevelling and lap-out of transgressive shales might be interpreted as evidence that the forebulge migrated towards the thrust load over a period of <1 Myr.  相似文献   

7.
Abstract Low‐angle detachment faults and thrust‐sheet top basins are common features in foreland basins. However, in stratigraphic analysis their influence on sequence architecture is commonly neglected. Usually, only eustatic sea level and changing flexural subsidence are accounted for, and when deformation is considered, the emphasis is on the generation of local thrust‐flank unconformities. This study analyses the effects of detachment angle and repetitive detachment activation on stratigraphic stacking patterns in a large thrust‐sheet top basin by applying a three‐dimensional numerical model. Model experiments show that displacement over low‐angle faults (2–6°) at moderate rates (～5.0 m kyr?1) results in a vertical uplift component sufficient to counteract the background flexural subsidence rate. Consequently, the basin‐wide accommodation space is reduced, fluvio‐deltaic systems carried by the thrust‐sheet prograde and part of the sediment supply is spilled over towards adjacent basins. The intensity of the forced regression and the interconnectedness of fluvial sheet sandstones increases with the dip angle of the detachment fault or rate of displacement. In addition, the delta plain is susceptible to the formation of incised valleys during eustatic falls because these events are less compensated by regional flexural subsidence, than they would be in the absence of fault displacement.  相似文献   

8.
Abstract An equation to relate the thickness of sediment deposited (ΔSed), eustatic sea-level change (ΔE), and subsidence (ΔSub), to changes in depth of water (ΔD) is: ΔSub +ΔE-ΔSed =ΔD.
Using existing sea-level curves, the equation shows that some transgressive-regressive sequences in a foreland basin and a composite seismic facies sequence on a passive margin cannot result solely from eustatic variation. In each case, the space created by subsidence is greater than that provided by eustatic rise. However, eustatic variation could have triggered sequence development if superimposed on a basin with relatively constant values of the other parameters. Short-period sea-level fluctuations with high rates of change, exceeding 70–100 m Myr-1 for periods less than 2–3 Myr, affect the stratigraphy and sedimentology more than longer period, higher amplitude variations.
Clinoforms are generated because of lateral variations in sedimentation rate compared to the rate of creation of accommodation space. These variations may result from differing sedimentation rates, subsidence rates, or rates of eustatic change, superimposed on a basin with lateral sediment supply. Clinoform slopes and curvatures are interpre table in terms of these variables as well as the type of sediment supplied and the energy distribution in the basin.
These equations put some well-known geological principles on a simple quantitative basis. They force precision in definition of variables, and may lead to further development of quantitative techniques in stratigraphy and sedimentology.  相似文献   

9.
《Basin Research》2018,30(Z1):269-288
A number of major controversies exist in the South China Sea, including the timing and pattern of seafloor spreading, the anomalous alternating strike‐slip movement on the Red River Fault, the existence of anomalous post‐rift subsidence and how major submarine canyons have developed. The Qiongdongnan Basin is located in the intersection of the northern South China Sea margin and the strike‐slip Red River fault zone. Analysing the subsidence of the Qiongdongnan Basin is critical in understanding these controversies. The basin‐wide unloaded tectonic subsidence is computed through 1D backstripping constrained by the reconstruction of palaeo‐water depths and the interpretation of dense seismic profiles and wells. Results show that discrete subsidence sags began to form in the central depression during the middle and late Eocene (45–31.5 Ma). Subsequently in the Oligocene (31.5–23 Ma), more faults with intense activity formed, leading to rapid extension with high subsidence (40–90 m Myr−1). This extension is also inferred to be affected by the sinistral movement of the offshore Red River Fault as new subsidence sags progressively formed adjacent to this structure. Evidence from faults, subsidence, magmatic intrusions and strata erosion suggests that the breakup unconformity formed at ca. 23 Ma, coeval with the initial seafloor spreading in the southwestern subbasin of the South China Sea, demonstrating that the breakup unconformity in the Qiongdongnan Basin is younger than that observed in the Pearl River Mouth Basin (ca. 32–28 Ma) and Taiwan region (ca. 39–33 Ma), which implies that the seafloor spreading in the South China Sea began diachronously from east to west. The post‐rift subsidence was extremely slow during the early and middle Miocene (16 m Myr−1, 23–11.6 Ma), probably caused by the transient dynamic support induced by mantle convection during seafloor spreading. Subsequently, rapid post‐rift subsidence occurred during the late Miocene (144 m Myr−1, 11.6–5.5 Ma) possibly as the dynamic support disappeared. The post‐rift subsidence slowed again from the Pliocene to the Quaternary (24 m Myr−1, 5.5–0 Ma), but a subsidence centre formed in the west with the maximum subsidence of ca. 450 m, which coincided with a basin with the sediment thickness exceeding 5500 m and is inferred to be caused by sediment‐induced ductile crust flow. Anomalous post‐rift subsidence in the Qiongdongnan Basin increased from ca. 300 m in the northwest to ca. 1200 m in the southeast, and the post‐rift vertical movement of the basement was probably the most important factor to facilitate the development of the central submarine canyon.  相似文献   

10.
ABSTRACT During the Eocene in the Corbières–Minervois foreland basin, southern France, there was a transition from marine carbonate to fluvial–lacustrine sedimentation. This evolution took place in six depositional sequences, the first controlled by a eustatic rise or flexural downwarping, then following under compressive tectonic conditions. The second to the fourth sequences show marine to marshy, mainly carbonate sediments with a transgressive–regressive evolution, while the last two comprise terrigenous and carbonate continental sediments. The tectonic evolution is marked by blind fault-propagation folds which deformed the basin during the Ilerdian–Cuisian. A paroxysmal compressive tectonic phase occurred at the Bartonian when the ancient blind thrusts started to emerge. A model for the evolution of the basin is presented, involving the northward propagation of structural culminations, which focused shallow water or emergent conditions, and structural lows in which deeper water sedimentation took place. The diachronous migration of these structural zones can be constrained from the high biostratigraphic resolution of the foreland basin fill.  相似文献   

11.
The Middle to Upper Ordovician foreland succession of the Ottawa Embayment in central Canada is divided into nine transgressive‐regressive sequences that defines net deepening of a platform succession over ~15 m.y. from peritidal to outer ramp settings, then a return to peritidal conditions over ~3 m.y. related to basin filling by orogen‐derived siliciclastics. With a backdrop of net eustatic rise through the Middle to Late Ordovician, there are several different expressions of structural influence on sequence development in the embayment. During the Middle Ordovician (Darriwilian), foreland‐basin initiation was marked by regional onlap with abundant synsedimentary deformation across a faulted trailing‐margin platform interior; subsequent craton‐interior uplift resulted in voluminous influx of siliciclastics contemporary with local structurally influenced local channelization; then, a formation of a platform‐interior shale basin defines continued intrabasin tectonism. During the Late Ordovician (Sandbian, early Katian), structural influence was superimposed on sea‐level rise as indicated by renewed local development of a platform‐interior shale basin; differential subsidence and thickness variation of platform carbonate successions; abrupt deepening across shallow‐water shoal facies; and, micrograben development coincident with foreland‐platform drowning. These stratigraphic patterns are far‐field expressions of distal orogen development amplified in the platform interior through basement reactivation along an inherited buried Precambrian fault system. Comparison of Upper Ordovician (Sandbian‐lower Katian) sequence stratigraphy in the Ottawa Embayment with eustatic frameworks defined for the Appalachian Basin reveals greater regional variation associated with Sandbian sequences compared to regional commonality in base level through the early Katian.  相似文献   

12.
By calculating mass accumulation rates for foreland basin sediments, the changing capacity of the basin can be monitored through time. It has often been assumed that there was a direct link between foreland basin sedimentation and tectonic deformation and lithospheric loading in the adjacent orogenic belt. The results of this study suggest that tectonic deformation is most likely associated with the changing capacity of the basin and the rate at which sediments accumulate within it, However, there appears to be no relation between tectonic deformation and the lithology of sediment which accumulates in the foreland basin. Instead, eustatic sea-level fluctuations appear to have significant control, through their impact on water depth, on the lithology of sediments accumulating in the foreland basin. These relations are evidenced by mass accumulation rates calculated for foreland basin strata in north-west Alberta and north-east British Columbia, Canada.  相似文献   

13.
Deposition and subsidence analysis, coupled with previous structural studies of the Sevier thrust belt, provide a means of reconstructing the detailed kinematic history of depositional response to episodic thrusting in the Cordilleran foreland basin of southern Wyoming, western interior USA. The Upper Cretaceous basin fill is divided into five megasequences bounded by unconformities. The Sevier thrust belt in northern Utah and southwestern Wyoming deformed in an eastward progression of episodic thrusting. Three major episodes of displacement on the Willard‐Meade, Crawford and ‘early’ Absaroka thrusts occurred from Aptian to early Campanian, and the thrust wedge gradually became supercritically tapered. The Frontier Formation conglomerate, Echo Canyon and Weber Canyon Conglomerates and Little Muddy Creek Conglomerate were deposited in response to these major thrusting events. Corresponding to these proximal conglomerates within the thrust belt, Megasequences 1, 2 and 3 were developed in the distal foreland of southern Wyoming. Two‐dimensional (2‐D) subsidence analyses show that the basin was divided into foredeep, forebulge and backbulge depozones. Foredeep subsidence in Megasequences 1, 2 and 3, resulting from Willard‐Meade, Crawford and ‘early’ Absaroka thrust loading, were confined to a narrow zone in the western part of the basin. Subsidence in the broad region east of the forebulge was dominantly controlled by sediment loading and inferred dynamic subsidence. Individual subsidence curves are characterized by three stages from rapid to slow. Controlled by relationships between accommodation and sediment supply, the basin was filled with retrogradational shales during periods of rapid subsidence, followed by progradational coarse clastic wedges during periods of slow subsidence. During middle Campanian time (ca. 78.5–73.4 Ma), the thrust wedge was stalled because of wedge‐top erosion and became subcritical, and the foredeep zone eroded and rebounded because of isostasy. The eroded sediments were transported far from the thrust belt, and constitute Megasequence 4 that was mostly composed of fluvial and coastal plain depositional systems. Subsidence rates were very slow, because of post‐thrusting rebound, and the resulting 2‐D subsidence was lenticular in an east–west direction. During late Campanian to early Maastrichtian time, widespread deposits of coarse sediment (the Hams Fork Conglomerate) aggraded the top of the thrust wedge after it stalled, prior to initiation of ‘late’ Absaroka thrusting. Meanwhile Megasequence 5 was deposited in the Wyoming foreland under the influence of both the intraforeland Wind River basement uplift and the Sevier thrust belt.  相似文献   

14.
ABSTRACT From study of Palaeozoic formations in the Appalachian foreland basin, a predictive stratigraphic model is proposed based on facies tract development during convergent-margin structural evolution. Five major facies tracts are recognized: shallow-water carbonates that formed during interorogenic quiescence and initial foreland subsidence; deep-water siliciclastics that accumulated in the proximal foreland basin during early collision; syn-collisional shallow-water siliciclastics; syn-collisional, channellized fluvial sandstones that aggraded in the proximal foreland; and progradational shoreline sandstones that were deposited in response to filling of the proximal foreland. Two other facies tracts that occur are organic-rich siliciclastics ('black shales'), which accumulated in oxygen-deficient areas of low clastic-sediment influx, and incised valley-fill deposits, which formed where subsidence rate was low.
Because the origin of each facies tract is dependent upon a unique combination of rate of accommodation change and rate of sediment supply, facies tract distribution is predictable from spatial and temporal patterns of subsidence and uplift associated with plate convergence. Alternating phases of thrust loading and quiescence caused fluctuations between underfilled and overfilled conditions during Palaeozoic evolution of the Appalachian basin. Along-strike variations in stratigraphic thickness, facies tract distribution, and development of unconformities in the Appalachian basin reflect the influence of structural irregularities along the collisional margin. In distal parts of the Appalachian foreland and in areas of structural recesses, eustatic influence on stratigraphic patterns is expressed more clearly than in areas of higher subsidence rate.  相似文献   

15.
Abstract Simple elastic plate models have been used to determine the stratigraphic patterns that result from prograding sediment loads. The predicted patterns, which include coastal offlap/onlap and downlap in a basinward direction, are generally similar to observations of stratal geometry from Cenozoic sequences of the U.S. Atlantic and Gulf Coast margins. Coastal offlap is a feature of all models in which the water depth and elastic thickness of the lithosphere, T e (which is a measure of the long-term strength of the lithosphere), are held constant, and is caused by a seaward shift in the sediment load and its compensation as progradation proceeds. The coastal offlap pattern is reduced if sediments prograde into a subsiding basin, since subsidence causes an increase in the accommodation space and loading landward of a prograding wedge. The stratal geometry that results is complex, however, and depends on the sediment supply, the amount of subsidence, and T e. If the sediment supply to a subsiding basin proceeds in distinct 'pulses' (due, say, to different tectonic events in a source region) then it is possible to determine the relationship between stratal geometry and T e. Coastal offlap and downlap are features of most models where the lithosphere either has a constant T e slowly increases Te with time, or changes T e laterally; however, in the case where sediments prograde onto lithosphere that rapidly increases T e with rime, the offlap can be replaced by onlap. Lithospheric flexure due to prograding sediment loads is capable of producing a wide variety of stratal geometries and may therefore be an important factor to take into account when evaluating the relative role of tectonics and eustatic sea-level changes in controlling the stratigraphic record.  相似文献   

16.
An inferred burial and exhumation history of Pennsylvanian strata in the central Appalachian foreland basin is constrained by integrating palaeothermometers, geochronometers and estimated palaeogeothermal gradients. Vitrinite reflectance data and fluid inclusion homogenization temperatures indicate that burial of Lower and Upper Pennsylvanian strata of the Appalachian Plateau in West Virginia exceeded ～4.4 km during the late Permian and occurred at a rate of ～100 m Myr?1. Exhumation rates of ～10 m Myr?1 from the late Permian to the early Cretaceous are constrained using maximum burial conditions and published apatite fission track (AFT) ages. AFT and radiogenic helium ages indicate exhumation rates of ～30–50 m Myr?1 from the early to late Cretaceous. Radiogenic helium dates and present day sampling depths indicate that exhumation rates from the late Cretaceous to present were ～25 m Myr?1. Exhumation rates for Upper and Lower Pennsylvanian strata within the Appalachian Plateau are remarkably similar. Early slow exhumation was possibly driven primarily by isostatic rebound associated with Triassic rifting. The later, more rapid exhumation can be attributed to thermal expansion followed by lithospheric flexure related to sediment loading along the passive margin.  相似文献   

17.
Seven tectonic subsidence curves, based on outcrop data, have been calculated in order to constrain the geodynamic evolution of the Permian–Mesozoic sedimentary succession (up to 10 km thick) of the Central Southern Alps basin (Italy). The analysis of the tectonic subsidence curves, covering a time span of about 200 Ma, allowed us to quantify the subsidence rates, to document the activity of syndepositional fault systems and calculate their slip rates. Different stages, in terms of duration and magnitude of subsidence‐uplift trends, have been identified in the evolution of the basin. The fault activity, reconstructed by comparing subsidence curves from adjacent sectors, resulted as highly variable both temporally and spatially. Strike‐slip tectonics was coeval to Permian sedimentation, as suggested by the strong differences in the subsidence rates in the sections. The evolution and subsidence rates suggest a continental shelf deposition from Early Triassic to Carnian, when subsidence came to a stop. A rapid resumption of subsidence is observed from the Norian, with a subsidence pulse in the Late Norian, followed by the regional uplift, in the Late Rhaetian. The following Early Jurassic subsidence is characterized by tectonic subsidence similar to that of the Norian. The Norian and Early Jurassic pulses were characterized by the highest slip rates along growth faults and are identified as two distinct tectonic events. The Norian–Rhaetian event is tentatively related to transtensional tectonics whereas the Early Jurassic event is related to crustal extension. The Early Jurassic subsidence records a shift in space an time of the beginning of the extensional stage, from Late Hettangian to the east to Late Pliensbachian–Toarcian to the west. From the Toarcian to the Aptian, the curves are compatible with regional thermal subsidence, later followed (Albian–Cenomanian) by uplift pulses in a retrobelt foreland basin (from Cenomanian onward).  相似文献   

18.
The Tian Shan range formed in the late Cenozoic in response to the northward propagation of deformation related to the India–Eurasia continental collision. Precise timing of the Tian Shan uplift is required to understand possible mechanisms of continental lithosphere deformation and interactions between climate, tectonism and erosion. Here, we provide magnetostratigraphic age control on the northern Chinese Tian Shan foreland successions. A thorough rock magnetic analysis identifies haematite‐ and magnetite‐bearing alluvial fan deposits in the upper portion of the sampled strata as more reliable palaeomagnetic recorders than magnetite‐bearing fluvial and lacustrine deposits that are often maghaemitized in the lower part of the record. As a result, a robust correlation to the geomagnetic polarity time scale is obtained from 6 to 2 Ma while a tentative correlation is proposed from 6 to 16 Ma. Sediment accumulation rates increase from 155 to 260 m Myr?1 at 3.9±0.3 Ma. This change coincides with a gradual lithologic transition from fluvial (sandstone‐dominated) to alluvial fan (conglomerate‐dominated) deposits that likely records an approaching erosional source related to tectonically increased subsidence rather than differential compaction. Clear evidence for growth strata starting at an estimated age of ～2 Ma provides a minimum age for folding. These results are compared with previous magneotstratigraphic studies from the same and other sections of the northern Tian Shan foreland basin fill, thus enabling a critical assessment of the reliability of magnetostratigraphic dating and the significance of sediment accumulation rate variations with respect to facies variations and growth strata. Our results in the Taxi He section provide a sequence of events that is consistent with enhanced tectonic forcing starting at ～4 Ma, although a climatic contribution must be considered given the close relationship of these ages with the Pliocene climate deterioration.  相似文献   

19.
Foreland basin systems   总被引：32，自引：1，他引：32  
A foreland basin system is defined as: (a) an elongate region of potential sediment accommodation that forms on continental crust between a contractional orogenic belt and the adjacent craton, mainly in response to geodynamic processes related to subduction and the resulting peripheral or retroarc fold-thrust belt; (b) it consists of four discrete depozones, referred to as the wedge-top, foredeep, forebulge and back-bulge depozones – which of these depozones a sediment particle occupies depends on its location at the time of deposition, rather than its ultimate geometric relationship with the thrust belt; (c) the longitudinal dimension of the foreland basin system is roughly equal to the length of the fold-thrust belt, and does not include sediment that spills into remnant ocean basins or continental rifts (impactogens). The wedge-top depozone is the mass of sediment that accumulates on top of the frontal part of the orogenic wedge, including ‘piggyback’ and ‘thrust top’ basins. Wedge-top sediment tapers toward the hinterland and is characterized by extreme coarseness, numerous tectonic unconformities and progressive deformation. The foredeep depozone consists of the sediment deposited between the structural front of the thrust belt and the proximal flank of the forebulge. This sediment typically thickens rapidly toward the front of the thrust belt, where it joins the distal end of the wedge-top depozone. The forebulge depozone is the broad region of potential flexural uplift between the foredeep and the back-bulge depozones. The back-bulge depozone is the mass of sediment that accumulates in the shallow but broad zone of potential flexural subsidence cratonward of the forebulge. This more inclusive definition of a foreland basin system is more realistic than the popular conception of a foreland basin, which generally ignores large masses of sediment derived from the thrust belt that accumulate on top of the orogenic wedge and cratonward of the forebulge. The generally accepted definition of a foreland basin attributes sediment accommodation solely to flexural subsidence driven by the topographic load of the thrust belt and sediment loads in the foreland basin. Equally or more important in some foreland basin systems are the effects of subduction loads (in peripheral systems) and far-field subsidence in response to viscous coupling between subducted slabs and mantle–wedge material beneath the outboard part of the overlying continent (in retroarc systems). Wedge-top depozones accumulate under the competing influences of uplift due to forward propagation of the orogenic wedge and regional flexural subsidence under the load of the orogenic wedge and/or subsurface loads. Whereas most of the sediment accommodation in the foredeep depozone is a result of flexural subsidence due to topographic, sediment and subduction loads, many back-bulge depozones contain an order of magnitude thicker sediment fill than is predicted from flexure of reasonably rigid continental lithosphere. Sediment accommodation in back-bulge depozones may result mainly from aggradation up to an equilibrium drainage profile (in subaerial systems) or base level (in flooded systems). Forebulge depozones are commonly sites of unconformity development, condensation and stratal thinning, local fault-controlled depocentres, and, in marine systems, carbonate platform growth. Inclusion of the wedge-top depozone in the definition of a foreland basin system requires that stratigraphic models be geometrically parameterized as doubly tapered prisms in transverse cross-sections, rather than the typical ‘doorstop’ wedge shape that is used in most models. For the same reason, sequence stratigraphic models of foreland basin systems need to admit the possible development of type I unconformities on the proximal side of the system. The oft-ignored forebulge and back-bulge depozones contain abundant information about tectonic processes that occur on the scales of orogenic belt and subduction system.  相似文献   

20.
A perplexing macrogeomorphic problem is the persistence of topography in mountain ranges that were initially formed by orogenic events hundreds of millions of years old. In this paper, we deconvolve the post-Triassic macrogeomorphic history of a portion of one of these ranges, the central and northern Appalachians, using a well-documented offshore isopach sedimentary record of the US Atlantic margin. Topography is an important signature of tectonic, eustatic and/or geomorphic processes that produces changes in the erodible thickness of the crust (ETC). We define ETC as the total thickness of crust that would have to be consumed by erosion to reduce the mean elevation of a landscape to sea level. We use the term ‘source flux’, designated by ν˙, to describe the rate of change in ETC attributed to deep-seated geological processes such as crustal thickening, crustal extension, magmatic intrusions or dynamic flow in the mantle. In a mountain belt, the rate of change of mean elevation with respect to a base level, designated by ? ′, can be represented as ? ′ = c(ν˙ ? k d z ′ ?; ? c ) ?& hairsp;l˙ , where k d is a proportionality constant relating the mean mechanical erosion rate to mean elevation, ? c is the mean chemcial erosion rate, c  is a compensation ratio (held constant for Airy isostasy at 0.21) and l˙  is the rate of eustatic sea-level change. This equation describes the sum of constructive source terms, two destructive erosion terms and a eustatic sea-level term. We use this simple linear equation to develop a landscape evolution model based on the concept of a unit response function. The unit response function is analogous to a unit hydrograph which describes the relationship between input (rainfall) and output (discharge) in a hydrological system. In our case, we solve for the general relationship between the source flux into the mountain belt and the erosional flux out of the belt. Offshore sediment volumes are used to determine the erosional flux. Drainage basin area is treated as either a constant (pinned drainage divide) or as increasing through time (migrating drainage divide). We use a third-order polynomial fit to a global sea-level curve to account for long-term eustatically driven changes in ETC and in drainage basin area. Chemical erosion is treated as a constant fixed at 5 m Myr?1. We consider two end-member models. The first is a ‘tectonic’ model in which the source flux is allowed to vary while k d is assumed to be constant over geological time and equal to its mean Pleistocene value of about 0.07 Myr?1. The second is an ‘erodibility’ model in which k d is allowed to vary, reflecting changes in climatic, climatic variables and rock-type erodibility, while the source flux is held constant at zero. The ‘tectonic’ model reveals four important increases in the source flux, ranging from 200 to 2000 m Myr?1 that occur over short (<10 Myr) time spans, followed by a protracted period (>25 Myr) where ν˙ drops below zero to values of ?1000 to ?6000 m Myr?1. The ‘erodibility’ model produces a topography that decays in a step-like fashion from an initial mean elevation that ranges between ～1800 and 2300 m. These models cannot unequivocally distinguish the relative importance of tectonic vs. climatic processes in the macrogeomorphic evolution of the post-rift Appalachians, but they do provide some first-order quantitative prediction about these two end-member options. In light of existing stratigraphic, geological and thermochronological data, we favour the tectonic model because most of the events correlate well in time and form with known syn- and post-rift magmatic events. Nevertheless, the most recent episode of increased sediment flux to the offshore basins during the Miocene remains difficult to explain by either model. Limited evidence suggests that this event may reflect asthenospheric flow-driven uplift and the development of dynamically supported topography at a time when mechanical erosion rates were increasing in response to a cooling terrestrial climate.  相似文献   

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