Magmatism, migrating topography, and the transition from Sevier shortening to Basin and Range extension, western United States

ABSTRACT The paleogeographic evolution of the western U.S. Great Basin from the Late Cretaceous to the Cenozoic is critical to understanding how the North American Cordillera at this latitude transitioned from Mesozoic shortening to Cenozoic extension. According to a widely applied model, Cenozoic extension was driven by collapse of elevated crust supported by crustal thicknesses that were potentially double the present ~30–35 km. This model is difficult to reconcile with more recent estimates of moderate regional extension (≤50%) and the discovery that most high-angle, Basin and Range faults slipped rapidly ca. 17 Ma, tens of millions of years after crustal thickening occurred. Here, we integrated new and existing geochronology and geologic mapping in the Elko area of northeast Nevada, one of the few places in the Great Basin with substantial exposures of Paleogene strata. We improved the age control for strata that have been targeted for studies of regional paleoelevation and paleoclimate across this critical time span. In addition, a regional compilation of the ages of material within a network of middle Cenozoic paleodrainages that developed across the Great Basin shows that the age of basal paleovalley fill decreases southward roughly synchronous with voluminous ignimbrite flareup volcanism that swept south across the region ca. 45–20 Ma. Integrating these data sets with the regional record of faulting, sedimentation, erosion, and magmatism, we suggest that volcanism was accompanied by an elevation increase that disrupted drainage systems and shifted the continental divide east into central Nevada from its Late Cretaceous location along the Sierra Nevada arc. The north-south Eocene–Oligocene drainage divide defined by mapping of paleovalleys may thus have evolved as a dynamic feature that propagated southward with magmatism. Despite some local faulting, the northern Great Basin became a vast, elevated volcanic tableland that persisted until dissection by Basin and Range faulting that began ca. 21–17 Ma. Based on this more detailed geologic framework, it is unlikely that Basin and Range extension was driven by Cretaceous crustal overthickening; rather, preexisting crustal structure was just one of several factors that that led to Basin and Range faulting after ca. 17 Ma—in addition to thermal weakening of the crust associated with Cenozoic magmatism, thermally supported elevation, and changing boundary conditions. Because these causal factors evolved long after crustal thickening ended, during final removal and fragmentation of the shallowly subducting Farallon slab, they are compatible with normal-thickness (~45–50 km) crust beneath the Great Basin prior to extension and do not require development of a strongly elevated, Altiplano-like region during Mesozoic shortening.

Tectonostratigraphy and major structures of the Georgian Greater Caucasus: Implications for structural architecture, along-strike continuity, and orogen evolution

Although the Greater Caucasus Mountains have played a central role in absorbing late Cenozoic convergence between the Arabian and Eurasian plates, the orogenic architecture and the ways in which it accommodates modern shortening remain debated. Here, we addressed this problem using geologic mapping along two transects across the southern half of the western Greater Caucasus to reveal a suite of regionally coherent stratigraphic packages that are juxtaposed across a series of thrust faults, which we call the North Georgia fault system. From south to north within this system, stratigraphically repeated ~5–10-km-thick thrust sheets show systematically increasing bedding dip angles (<30° in the south to subvertical in the core of the range). Likewise, exhumation depth increases toward the core of the range, based on low-temperature thermochronologic data and metamorphic grade of exposed rocks. In contrast, active shortening in the modern system is accommodated, at least in part, by thrust faults along the southern margin of the orogen. Facilitated by the North Georgia fault system, the western Greater Caucasus Mountains broadly behave as an in-sequence, southward-propagating imbricate thrust fan, with older faults within the range progressively abandoned and new structures forming to accommodate shortening as the thrust propagates southward. We suggest that the single-fault-centric “Main Caucasus thrust” paradigm is no longer appropriate, as it is a system of faults, the North Georgia fault system, that dominates the architecture of the western Greater Caucasus Mountains.

Structural Evolution of the Central Kiruna Area, Northern Norrbotten, Sweden: Implications on the Geologic Setting Generating Iron Oxide-Apatite and Epigenetic Iron and Copper Sulfides

To guide future exploration, this predominantly field based study has investigated the structural evolution of the central Kiruna area, the type locality for iron oxide-apatite deposits that stands for a significant amount of the European iron ore production. Using a combination of geologic mapping focusing on structures and stratigraphy, petrography with focus on microstructures, X-ray computed tomography imaging of sulfide-structure relationships, and structural 2D-forward modeling, a structural framework is provided including spatial-temporal relationships between iron oxide-apatite emplacement, subeconomic Fe and Cu sulfide mineralization, and deformation. These relationships are important to constrain as a guidance for exploration in iron oxide-apatite and iron oxide copper-gold prospective terrains and may help to understand the genesis of these deposit types. Results suggest that the iron oxide-apatite deposits were emplaced in an intracontinental back-arc basin, and they formed precrustal shortening under shallow crustal conditions. Subsequent east-west crustal shortening under greenschist facies metamorphism inverted the basin along steep to moderately steep E-dipping structures, often subparallel with bedding and lithological contacts, with reverse, oblique to dip-slip, east-block-up sense of shears. Fe and Cu sulfides associated with Fe oxides are hosted by structures formed during the basin inversion and are spatially related to the iron oxide-apatite deposits but formed in fundamentally different structural settings and are separated in time. The inverted basin was gently refolded and later affected by hydraulic fracturing, which represent the last recorded deformation-hydrothermal events affecting the crustal architecture of central Kiruna.

Stratigraphy of the Eocene–Oligocene Titus Canyon Formation, Death Valley, California, and Eocene extensional tectonism in the Basin and Range

Geologic mapping, measured sections, and geochronologic data elucidate the tectono-stratigraphic development of the Titus Canyon extensional basin in Death Valley, California, and provide new constraints on the age of the Titus Canyon Formation, one of the earliest syn-extensional deposits in the central Basin and Range. Detrital zircon maximum depositional ages (MDAs) and compiled 40Ar/39Ar ages indicate that the Titus Canyon Formation spans 40(?)–30 Ma, consistent with an inferred Duchesnean age for a unique assemblage of mammalian fossils in the lower part of the formation. The Titus Canyon Formation preserves a shift in depositional environment from fluvial to lacustrine at ca. 35 Ma, which along with a change in detrital zircon provenance may reflect both the onset of local extensional tectonism and climatic changes at the Eocene–Oligocene boundary. Our data establish the Titus Canyon basin as the southernmost basin in a system of late Eocene extensional basins that formed along the axis of the Sevier orogenic belt. The distribution of lacustrine deposits in these Eocene basins defines the extent of a low-relief orogenic plateau (Nevadaplano) that occupied eastern Nevada at least through Eocene time. As such, the age and character of Titus Canyon Formation implies that the Nevadaplano extended into the central Basin and Range, ~200 km farther south than previously recognized. Development of the Titus Canyon extensional basin precedes local Farallon slab removal by ca. 20 Ma, implying that other mechanisms, such as plate boundary stress changes due to decreased convergence rates in Eocene time, are a more likely trigger for early extension in the central Basin and Range.

Pandemic Minecrafting: an analysis of the perceptions of and lessons learned from a gamified virtual geology field camp

To mimic the 3D geospatial components of geologic mapping usually spotlighted by field camp, we developed a virtual course based in the sandbox video game Minecraft. Paired with audio/video conferencing and real data, students practiced measuring strike and dip, orienteering with a compass, matching landscape features with topographic maps, and tracing geologic contacts within the team structure typically employed in field camp. Open-source programs and tutorials freely available online assisted with constructing the Minecraft worlds. Assignments were aligned to the nine learning outcomes established for geology field camps by the National Association of Geology Teachers (NAGT). A pre-survey and post-survey quantified students' learning of the subject matter as well as perceptions towards Minecraft and online learning. We also held feedback sessions and conducted in-class, live observations to classify students' reactions and experiences during virtual activities. Overwhelmingly, students indicated they would have preferred an in-person field camp, yet they considered the Minecraft assignments exciting, important, interesting, and valuable. Regardless of perceived barriers, scores on subject matter questions increased from the pre- to the post-survey. Finally, observations illustrated how students' experiences in a virtual field camp recreated comparable components that students experience during an in-person field camp (e.g., students discussing career pathways, geological skills, and fostering interpersonal relationships). Because this virtual course achieved the curricular goals as well as the non-curricular goals and was relatively easy to construct, we recommend the usage of Minecraft for virtual geology courses in the future.

Cenozoic structural evolution of the Catalina metamorphic core complex and reassembly of Laramide reverse faults, southeastern Arizona, USA

This study investigates the Late Cretaceous through mid-Cenozoic struc­tural evolution of the Catalina core complex and adjacent areas by integrating new geologic mapping, structural analysis, and geochronologic data. Multiple generations of normal faults associated with mid-Cenozoic extensional deformation cut across older reverse faults that formed during the Laramide orogeny. A proposed stepwise, cross-sectional structural reconstruction of mid-Cenozoic extension satisfies surface geologic and reflection seismologic constraints, balances, and indicates that detachment faults played no role in the formation of the core complex and Laramide reverse faults represent major thick-skinned structures. The orientations of the oldest synextensional strata, pre-shortening nor­mal faults, and pre-Cenozoic strata unaffected by Laramide compression indicate that rocks across most of the study area were steeply tilted east since the mid-Cenozoic. Crosscutting relations between faults and synextensional strata reveal that sequential generations of primarily down-to-the-west, mid- Cenozoic normal faults produced the net eastward tilting of ~60°. Restorations of the balanced cross section demonstrate that Cenozoic normal faults were originally steeply dipping and resulted in an estimated 59 km or 120% extension across the study area. Representative segments of those gently dipping faults are exposed at shallow, intermediate (~5–10 km), and deep structural levels (~10–20 km), as distinguished by the nature of deformation in the exhumed footwall, and these segments all restore to high angles, which indicates that they were not listric. Offset on major normal faults does not exceed 11 km, as opposed to tens of kilometers of offset commonly ascribed to “detachment” faults in most interpretations of this and other Cordilleran metamorphic core complexes. Once mid-Cenozoic extension is restored, reverse faults with moderate to steep original dips bound basement-cored uplifts that exhibit significant involvement of basement rocks. Net vertical uplift from all reverse faults is estimated to be 9.4 km, and estimated total shortening was 12 km or 20%. This magnitude of uplift is consistent with the vast exposure of metamorphosed and foliated cover strata in the northeastern and eastern Santa Catalina and Rincon Mountains and with the distribution of subsequently dismembered mid-Cenozoic erosion surfaces along the San Pedro Valley. New and existing geochronologic data constrain the timing of offset on local reverse faults to ca. 75–54 Ma. The thick-skinned style of Laramide shortening in the area is consistent with the structure of surrounding locales. Because detachment faults do not appear to have resulted in the formation of the Catalina core complex, other extensional systems that have been interpreted within the context of detachments may require further structural analyses including identification of crosscutting relations between generations of normal faults and palinspastic reconstructions.