Developments in Geotectonics Series

Global Tectonics and Earthquake Risk discusses the geostatistical treatment of earthquake probabilities. The book reviews global tectonics and geologic history, including evidence of change, Pangaea, geochronology, tectonic revolutions, and the breakup of Pangaea. The book discusses the formation of Pangaea which later broke down into the present continental cores of Asia, Europe, Africa, Australian, Antarctica, and the Americas. The book describes the separation of North and South America from Europe, how Africa became established during the Cretaceous time, and how India split off from Africa to became welded to Asia at the Himalayas. The text also explains earthquake risk in terms of stochastic processes, point processes, and illustrates modeling of the earthquake process. The "Large-Earthquake Model" is based on a list of the largest earthquakes in the region, while a more sophisticated model requires the incorporation of non-Markovian effects (aftershock sequences). The book cites an application of investigations done on California where an earthquake of magnitude 5 is expected to occur every three months. An earthquake of magnitude 8 or greater is predicted to happen every 100 years but the book notes that the return period exceeds the range of the period of recorded data (which is only 31 years). Presented in another way, the text concludes that the probability of occurrence of an event of magnitude 8 earthquake or over in any given year is about one percent. The book can prove helpful for geologists, seismologists, meteorologists, or practitioners in the field of civil and structural engineering.

Developments in Geotectonics, 10: The Expanding Earth focuses on the principles, methodologies, transformations, and approaches involved in the expanding earth concept. The book first elaborates on the development of the expanding earth concept, necessity for expansion, and the subduction myth. Discussions focus on higher velocity under Benioff zone, seismic attenuation, blue schists and paired metamorphic belts, dispersion of polygons, arctic paradox, and kinematic contrast. The manuscript then ponders on the scale of tectonic phenomena, non-uniformitarianism, tectonic profiles, and paleomagnetism. Concerns cover global paleomagnetism, general summary of the tectonic profile, implosions, fluid pressures, pure shear, crustal extension, simple shear with horizontal axis, geological examples of scale fields, and length-time fields of deformation. The publication explores the cause of expansion, modes of crustal extension, and rotation and asymmetry of the earth, including dynamic asymmetry, precessions, nutations, librations, and wobbles at fixed obliquity, variation of rate of rotation, and categories of submarine ridges. The text is a dependable source of data for researchers wanting to study the concept of expanding earth.

Selected papers from the Lunar and Planetary Institute Topical Conference, St. Helena, CA, USA, 3-5 Dec. 1981

Developments in Geotectonics, Volume 20: Recent Crustal Movements, 1982 presents the proceedings of the 3rd Symposium on Recent Crustal Movements and Phenomena Associated with Earthquakes and Volcanism, held in Tokyo, Japan on May 12–13, 1982. This book presents the results in crustal movement studies at a local or regional scale. Organized into four parts encompassing 45 chapters, this volume begins with an overview of the gravimetric research carried out in various locations in Maracaibo Basin Area. This text then evaluates the reliability of the leveling measurements using modified geodetic checks as well as through comparison with independent measurements of crustal movement. Other chapters consider the basis of geodetic strain analysis. This book discusses as well the first-order geodetic measurements in seismically active areas in southern and southwestern Australia. The final chapter deals with the correlation of the data of relevelling with surface relief. This book is a valuable resource for engineers and geologists.

This volume contains a collection of papers presented as distinguished guest lectures at the International Conference on ``The Origin of Arcs'' held at the University of Urbino in September 1986, under the joint sponsorship of the European Union of Geosciences and the Italian Geological Society. The workshop on island and mountain arcs has been organized with the aim of increasing our understanding of the intrinsic nature of orogenic and post-orogenic processes, on the basis of empiric factual data, rather than particular theoretic models. Quite often a trivial piece of field data appears to bear much more weight than many fascinating hypotheses put forward by the human mind. This seems to be much more valid in geology, where a special method is necessitated by the particular nature of the geological phenomena and the time concept. Every general law deduced should be rooted in the study of the earth's development in geological time. It is the editor's opinion that there must first be an inductive picture by means of geological methods and then it must be interpreted by geophysicists in the light of physical laws. The geological method must serve, besides, to test the historical credibility of geophysical theories. It is clear that these two methods, the geological-historical one and the geophysical one, must be complementary and the one must not substitute the other. Since the problem of the structure and origin of arcs is open to several solutions, different factors being still unexplained, all correctly deduced opinions are considered by the editor. The contributors to this pre-conference volume have been asked to present essential geological results, as concrete as possible, on some basic problems, such as: Are the island and mountain arcs primary or induced features? How have these orogenic festoons developed into their similar regular shapes? What are the relationships between "primary" active arcs and "secondary" mountain arcs? What is the dominant deformational factor in the bulging of the arc? What is the real nature and tectonic significance of the Benioff zone? These papers have been grouped into five more or less natural sections, of which three are defined on the basis of geography. But of course several range broadly and the classification serves only to channel the discussion in a practical way.

The ensemble of manuscripts presented in this special volume captures the stimulating cross-disciplinary dialogue from the International Symposium on Deep Structure, Composition, and Evolution of Continents, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 15-17 October 1997. It will provide an update on recent research developments and serve as a starting point for research of the many outstanding issues. After its formation at mid-oceanic spreading centers, oceanic lithosphere cools, thickens, and subsides, until it subducts into the deep mantle beneath convergent margins. As a result of this continuous recycling process oceanic lithosphere is typically less than 200 million years old (the global average is about 80 Myr). A comprehensive, multi-disciplinary study of continents involves a wide range of length scales: tiny rock samples and diamond inclusions may yield isotope and trace element signatures diagnostic for the formation age and evolution of (parts of) cratons, while geophysical techniques (e.g., seismic and electromagnetic imaging) constrain variations of elastic and conductive properties over length scales ranging from several to many thousand kilometers. Integrating and reconciling this information is far from trivial and, as several papers in this volume document, the relationships between, for instance, formation age and tectonic behavior on the one hand and the seismic signature, heat flow, and petrology on the other may not be uniform but may vary both within as well as between cratons. These observations complicate attempts to determine the variations of one particular observable (e.g., heat flow, lithosphere thickness) as a function of another (e.g., crustal age) on the basis of global data compilations and tectonic regionalizations. Important conclusions of the work presented here are that (1) continental deformation, for instance shortening, is not restricted to the crust but also involves the lithospheric mantle; (2) the high wavespeed part of continental lithospheric mantle is probably thinner than inferred previously from vertically travelling body waves or form global surface-wave models; and (3) the seismic signature of ancient continents is more complex than expected from a uniform relationship with crustal age.