Browsing by Author "Heberer, Bianca"

The western sector of the Qinling-Dabie orogenic belt plays a key role in both Late Jurassic to Early Cretaceous "Yanshanian" intracontinental tectonics and Cenozoic lateral escape triggered by India-Asia collision. The Taibai granite in the northern Qinling Mountains is located at the westernmost tip of a Yanshanian granite belt. It consists of multiple intrusions, constrained by new Late Jurassic and Early Cretaceous U-Pb zircon ages (156 +/- 3 Ma and 124 +/- 1 Ma). Applying various geochronometers (Ar-40/Ar-39 on hornblende, biotite and K-feldspar, apatite fission-track, apatite [U-Th-Sm]/He) along a vertical profile of the Taibai Mountain refines the cooling and exhumation history. The new age constraints record the prolonged pre-Cenozoic intracontinental deformation as well as the cooling history mostly related to India-Asia collision. We detected rapid cooling for the Taibai granite from ca. 800 to 100 degrees C during Early Cretaceous (ca. 123 to 100 Ma) followed by a period of slow cooling from ca. 100 Ma to ca. 25 Ma, and pulsed exhumation of the low-relief Cretaceous peneplain during Cenozoic times. We interpret the Early Cretaceous rapid cooling and exhumation as a result from activity along the southern sinistral lithospheric scale tear fault of the recently postulated intracontinental subduction of the Archean/Palaeoproterozoic North China Block beneath the Alashan Block. A Late Oligocene to Early Miocene cooling phase might be triggered either by the lateral motion during India-Asia collision and/or the Pacific subduction zone. Late Miocene intensified cooling is ascribed to uplift of the Tibetan Plateau. (C) 2014 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.

Indentation of rigid blocks into rheologically weak orogens is generally associated with spatiotemporally variable vertical and lateral block extrusion. The European Eastern and Southern Alps are a prime example of microplate indentation, where most of the deformation was accommodated north of the crustal indenter within the Tauern Window. However, outside of this window only the broad late-stage exhumation pattern of the indented units as well as of the indenter itself is known. In this study we refine the exhumational pattern with new (U-Th-Sm)/He and fission-track thermochronology data on apatite from the Karawanken Mountains adjacent to the eastern Periadriatic fault and from the central-eastern Southern Alps. Apatite (U-Th-Sm)/He ages from the Karawanken Mountains range between 12 and 5 Ma and indicate an episode of fault-related exhumation leading to the formation of a positive flower structure and an associated peripheral foreland basin. In the Southern Alps, apatite (U-Th-Sm)/He and fission-track data combined with previous data also indicate a pulse of mainly Late Miocene exhumation, which was maximized along thrust systems, with highly differential amounts of displacement along individual structures. Our data contribute to mounting evidence for widespread Late Miocene tectonic activity, which followed a phase of major exhumation during strain localization in the Tauern Window. We attribute this exhumational phase and more distributed deformation during Adriatic indentation to a major change in boundary conditions operating on the orogen, likely due to a shift from a decoupled to a coupled system, possibly enhanced by a shift in convergence direction.

Abstract Fold and thrust belt architecture may be influenced by basement geometry of the downgoing plate. This influence is notoriously difficult to assess due to a common lack of subsurface constraints and low resolution of exhumation estimates in space and time. The Bohemian Spur is a basement high at the transition from the Alps to the Carpathians. It coincides with narrowing of the foreland basin and an orogen‐scale change of strike. Its location in one of the best‐studied orogens in the world makes it an ideal case for understanding how basement topography influences fold and thrust belt tectonics. However, since thermochronological studies were mainly focused on the core of the Alps, timing and amount of exhumation remain poorly constrained in these peripheral parts of the orogen. We present new apatite (U‐Th)/He and fission track data from the wedge above the Bohemian Spur. Thermally reset ages monitor a so far un(der)appreciated phase of prominent Late Oligocene to Miocene cooling, associated with crustal thickening, uplift and erosion during wedge propagation. Pronounced exhumation on the order of 3–4.5 km can be related to basement steps beneath the advancing wedge. The spur acted as a buttress for foreland‐propagating thrusting, pinning deformation and nucleating antiformal stacking and duplexing and thus exhumation above it. We illustrate how along‐ and across‐strike changes of sub‐detachment topography impact wedge propagation and control fold and thrust belt geometries. The buttressing effect accounts for most of the exhumation, while deep‐seated slab dynamics are of subordinate importance for wedge uplift.