Plate-induced Miocene extension in southern California
- Geological Survey, Pasadena, CA (United States) Univ. of California, Santa Barbara, CA (United States)
Miocene crustal extension in southern California can be explained by the interaction of tectonic plates in relative motion. The Pacific, Juan de Fuca, and Farallon (Guadalupe) plates are represented by flat elastic plates surrounded by an infinite elastic plate, the eastern part of which represents the North America plate. Forcing is by assigned subduction pull, and tractions at all plate boundaries satisfy a viscous constitutive law. Plate bottoms are stress-free. In the first part of the solution plate velocities and boundary tractions are found from static equilibrium. Then principal horizontal stresses and strains in plate interiors caused by tractions and subduction pull are found by a boundary element procedure. Using plate boundary geometry from Stock and Hodges for early- and mid-Miocene times, it is found that the portion of the North America plate margin between the Mendocino and Rivera triple junctions has maximum extensional strain directed westward. This result is generally consistent with directions associated with metamorphic core complex formation in southern California. The model is also consistent with extensional strain and rotation sense of crustal blocks in the vicinity of Los Angeles, as inferred by Luyendyk and others from paleomagnetic data. In the model the greatest extensional strain of the North America plate occurs near the Pacific-North America transform, in the area above the absent Farallon slab. Extension direction varies from northwest to southwest according to plate geometry, subduction pull (Juan de Fuca and Guadalupe), and plate boundary tractions.
- OSTI ID:
- 5588816
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-921058-; CODEN: GAAPBC
- Journal Information:
- Geological Society of America, Abstracts with Programs; (United States), Vol. 24:7; Conference: 1992 annual meeting of the Geological Society of America (GSA), Cincinnati, OH (United States), 26-29 Oct 1992; ISSN 0016-7592
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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Early Miocene transpression across the Pacific-North American plate margin, initiation of the San Andreas fault, and tectonic wedge activation
Early, middle, and late Miocene basin development, California