Lithospheric Structure Beneath the Alboran Basin: Results from 3D Gravity Modeling and Tectonic Relevance

Torné, Montserrat; Fernández, Manel; Comas, M. C.; Soto, Juan I.

doi:10.1029/1999jb900281

Cited by 145 publications

(164 citation statements)

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“…Most of them combine geoid gravity, topography, and heat flow data (e.g. Torné et al 2000;Fullea et al 2007Fullea et al , 2010. The reported values are consistently larger over the whole area.…”

Section: A Shallow Lithosphere-asthenosphere Boundary (Lab)mentioning

confidence: 67%

“…They found deeper values of ∼90-100 km beneath the Betics and Rif mountain ranges, the south of Portugal and Morocco foreland. Studies from potential fields inversion provide, too, lithospheric thickness estimations (Torné et al 2000;Fullea et al 2007Fullea et al , 2010. They reported the same areas with thick lithosphere as the S-RF study but shown strong discrepancies in the values of LAB depths with ∼140 km as their maximum value.…”

Section: Geological Setting and Previous Analysismentioning

confidence: 75%

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Crustal thickness and images of the lithospheric discontinuities in the Gibraltar arc and surrounding areas

Mancilla

Stich

Morales

et al. 2015

Geophysical Journal International

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S U M M A R YThe Gibraltar arc and surrounding areas are a complex tectonic region and its tectonic evolution since Miocene is still under debate. Knowledge of its lithospheric structure will help to understand the mechanisms that produced extension and westward motion of the Alboran domain, simultaneously with NW-SE compression driven by Africa-Europe plates convergence. We perform a P-wave receiver function analysis in which we analyse new data recorded at 83 permanent and temporary seismic broad-band stations located in the South of the Iberian peninsula. These data are stacked and combined with data from a previous study in northern Morocco to build maps of thickness and average v P /v S ratio for the crust, and cross-sections to image the lithospheric discontinuities beneath the Gibraltar arc, the Betic and Rif Ranges and their Iberian and Moroccan forelands. Crustal thickness values show strong lateral variations in the southern Iberia peninsula, ranging from ∼19 to ∼46 km. The Variscan foreland is characterized by a relatively flat Moho at ∼31 km depth, and an average v P /v S ratio of ∼1.72, similar to other Variscan terranes, which may indicate that part of the lower crustal orogenic root was lost. The thickest crust is found at the contact between the Alboran domain and the External Zones of the Betic Range, while crustal thinning is observed southeastern Iberia (down to 19 km) and in the Guadalquivir basin where the thinning at the Iberian paleomargin could be still preserved. In the cross-sections, we see a strong change between the eastern Betics, where the Iberian crust underthrusts and couples to the Alboran crust, and the western Betics, where the underthrusting Iberian crust becomes partially delaminated and enters into the mantle. The structures largely mirror those on the Moroccan side where a similar detachment was observed in northern Morocco. We attribute a relatively shallow strong negativepolarity discontinuity to the lithosphere-asthenosphere boundary. This means relatively thin lithosphere ranging from ∼50 km thickness in southeastern Iberia and northeastern Morocco to ∼90-100 km beneath the western Betics and the Rif, with abrupt changes of ∼30 km under the central Betics and northern Morocco. Our observations support a geodynamic scenario where in western Betics oceanic subduction has developed into ongoing continental subduction/delamination while in eastern Betics this process is inactive.

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Section: A Shallow Lithosphere-asthenosphere Boundary (Lab)mentioning

confidence: 67%

Section: Geological Setting and Previous Analysismentioning

confidence: 75%

Crustal thickness and images of the lithospheric discontinuities in the Gibraltar arc and surrounding areas

Mancilla

Stich

Morales

et al. 2015

Geophysical Journal International

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“…It is characterised by low-angle intracrustal detachments and shallow normal faulting induced by Early to early Late Miocene extension (e.g. Galindo-Zaldívar et al, 1989;García-Dueñas et al, 1992; Comas et al, 1999;Torné et al, 2000). The exact location of the eastern plate-boundary sector has turned out to be very difficult to establish unambiguously.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…It was initiated after a Late Oligocene-earliest Miocene period of crustal extension (Sanz de Galdeano, 2000), low-angle normal faulting (e.g. Platt & Vissers, 1989) and crustal thinning (Torné et al, 2000) that strongly affected the Internal Zone contemporaneously with the initial phase of rifting of the Valencia Trough and Algéro-Provençal Basin (Sanz de Galdeano, 1988, 1990a,b, 2000. The effects of the 'post-collision' phase of tectonic deformation, which encompassed large-scale overthrusting during compressional pulses (Crespo-Blanc et al, 1994), propagated externally into the foreland until the Late Miocene, i.e.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Punctuated Neogene tectonics and stratigraphy of the African-Iberian plate-boundary zone: concurrent development of Betic-Rif basins (southern Spain, northern Morocco)

Sissingh

2008

Netherlands Journal of Geosciences

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The geological configuration of the present-day Mediterranean is characterized by a complex and extensive system of both interconnected and fragmented fold-and thrust belts that is associated with back-arc basins (e.g. Carminati et al., 1998;Rosenbaum & Lister, 2004). Their tectonic structure and setting are varied, and the compressional origin and growth of the different belts and the formation of the adjoining extensional basins also varies considerably in age. The different fold-andthrusts belts did not evolve during one single, uninterrupted cycle of Alpine orogenesis, but are the ultimate outcome of a prolonged, polyphase process of intermittent plate-tectonic interaction between the African-Arabian and Eurasian plates. This resulted in the creation and ultimate disappearance of two major oceanic basins, the Palaeotethys (mainly Palaeozoic) and the Neotethys (late Palaeozoic-Mesozoic). As in the preceding Jurassic and Cretaceous times, the motions of Africa-Arabia relative to Eurasia during the Tertiary were an important control on the geological evolution of the Alpine Tethys (late Mesozoic-Tertiary). Various kinematic frameworks for palaeotectonic and palaeogeographic reconstructions have been proposed for the region (e.g. Dewey et al., 1989;Rosenbaum et al., 2002). These were mostly based on analysis of rotation parameters (poles of rotation, rotation angles), which allowed to constrain past relative velocities between Africa and Eurasia. In addition, analysis of North Atlantic magnetic lineations helped to constrain the movement of Africa and Europe relative to North America. The consensus view is that during the Late Cretaceous Africa converged towards Europe in a S-N directed rotational mode. This was contemporaneous with spreading of the Azores part of the North Atlantic, the coeval opening of the Gulf of Biscay like a sphenochasm and the resulting anti-clockwise rotation of Iberia with respect to Eurasia. Sinistral motion occurred after an active plate boundary subject to left-lateral strike-slip faulting had been established at the northern margin of the Iberian block. Consequently, Iberia behaved like a promontory AbstractThis paper integrates the sequence stratigraphic and tectonic data related to the Neogene geodynamic and palaeogeographic development of the African-Iberian plate boundary zone between Spain and Morocco. Though the dating of individual tectonostratigraphic sequences and their delimiting sequence boundaries varies in accuracy and precision, their apparent correlation strongly suggests contemporaneous development of the Betic and Rif basins. This may likely be attributed to regional changes of the overall compressional intra-plate stress field. This, in turn, was governed by coeval plate-kinematic changes related to the ongoing collisional convergence of Africa and Iberia. The Neogene succession is characterised by brief tectonic pulses that governed the sequence stratigraphic development of the Betic-Rif basins (NBR phases). It broadly correlates with the coeval sequences in the ...

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“…The zone intricacy reflects its bathymetry, seismicity, stress regime and tectonics. Indeed, the bathymetry evidences the Gorringe Bank, the Horseshoe Abyssal Plain and the Guadalquivir bank (located west of the Strait of Gibraltar) with a number of seamounts, banks and submarine ridges with important regional crustal thickness variations, Torné et al (2000), as fundamental aspects. Besides, in land the main geological features are the Betics, the Rif Cordilleras and the Tell Mountains that are a consequence of the collision between Eurasia and Africa, and form the Alpine domain.…”

Section: The Ibero-maghrebian Regionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Seismo-electromagnetic phenomena in the western part of the Eurasia-Nubia plate boundary

Silva

Bezzeghoud

Rocha

et al. 2011

Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci.

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Abstract. This paper presents a work that aims to monitor seismo-electromagnetic phenomena in the Western Part of the Eurasia-Nubia Plate Boundary. This region has a significant tectonic activity combined with relatively low electromagnetic noise levels, rendering high quality seismoelectromagnetic measurements possible. An overview of the seismicity of this region is presented and the research plan is discussed accordingly.

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Lithospheric Structure Beneath the Alboran Basin: Results from 3D Gravity Modeling and Tectonic Relevance

Cited by 145 publications

References 68 publications

Crustal thickness and images of the lithospheric discontinuities in the Gibraltar arc and surrounding areas

Crustal thickness and images of the lithospheric discontinuities in the Gibraltar arc and surrounding areas

Punctuated Neogene tectonics and stratigraphy of the African-Iberian plate-boundary zone: concurrent development of Betic-Rif basins (southern Spain, northern Morocco)

Seismo-electromagnetic phenomena in the western part of the Eurasia-Nubia plate boundary

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