Fault and fold growth of the Amenthes uplift: Implications for Late Noachian crustal rheology and heat flow on Mars

Lithospheric Contraction on Mars: A 3D Model of the Amenthes Thrust Fault System

“…However, the depth of faulting of these faults in the area can be compared because it is expected that the BDT does not present large variations in such a small area during the same period of time. When we compare the depths of faulting of these three faults with those of previous works (Egea‐González et al, ; Mueller et al, ; Ruiz et al, ; Schultz & Watters, ), our estimates provide shallower values. The BDT is temperature and strain rate dependent (e.g., Artemieva, 2011; Ruiz et al, ).…”

“…Amenthes Rupes is located in the heavily cratered highlands of Mars (e.g., Caprarelli et al, 2007;Erkeling et al, 2011;Mueller et al, 2014;Schultz, 2003;Schultz & Watters, 2001;Watters, 2003b), specifically in the northeast of the Amenthes Region. This topographic structure is the morphological expression of the displacement on a large thrust fault with surface rupture (e.g., Mueller et al, 2014;Schultz & Watters, 2001).…”

“…Amenthes Rupes is located in the heavily cratered highlands of Mars (e.g., Caprarelli et al, 2007;Erkeling et al, 2011;Mueller et al, 2014;Schultz, 2003;Schultz & Watters, 2001;Watters, 2003b), specifically in the northeast of the Amenthes Region. This topographic structure is the morphological expression of the displacement on a large thrust fault with surface rupture (e.g., Mueller et al, 2014;Schultz & Watters, 2001). The main thrust fault that forms Amenthes Rupes is part of an array of five thrust faults underlying a set of lobate scarps (Schultz, 2003;Watters & Robinson, 1999), striking 120-140°E ( Figure 1), parallel to the NE margin of Amenthes Planum (Caprarelli et al, 2007), which is located southwest.…”

“…The Amenthes Rupes lobate scarp was formed in the Late Noachian/Early Hesperian (e.g., Schultz & Watters, 2001;Watters & Robinson, 1999), around 3.7 Ga ago (Egea-González et al, 2017). The Late Noachian highland crust, where lobate scarps formed, is expected to be formed by nonlayered rocks with more isotropic character than the Amazonian-Hesperian units that postdate them (e.g., Mueller et al, 2014;Schultz, 2000). Martian erosion rates have remained very low from Hesperian to the present (e.g., Golombek & Bridges, 2000;Golombek & Phillips, 2010), and this area does not show significant signs of erosion affecting the lobate scarps.…”

“…The most studied lobate scarp on Mars is Amenthes Rupes (e.g., Egea-González et al, 2017;Mueller et al, 2014;Ruiz et al, 2008;Schultz, 2003;Schultz & Watters, 2001;Watters et al, 2000), due to its large dimensions and its location near the dichotomy boundary (Watters, 2003b) (Figure 1), which makes its study essential when analyzing the mechanical and thermal properties and the evolution of the lithosphere of Mars (e.g., Egea-González et al, 2017;Ruiz et al, 2011;Schultz & Watters, 2001). The Amenthes Rupes lobate scarp, as well as most of the lobate scarps modeled on Mars, has been modeled through 2D cross sections analysis (e.g., Egea-González et al, 2017;Grott et al, 2007;Herrero-Gil et al, 2019;Mueller et al, 2014;Ruiz et al, 2008;Schultz & Watters, 2001). This 2D modeling applied to lobate scarps restricts the results obtained to the chosen cross sections of structures that are hundreds of kilometers long and present significant variations along their length (e.g., Herrero-Gil et al, 2020;Klimczak et al, 2018).…”