variations of the effective elastic thickness reveal tectonic fragmentation of the antarctic lithosphere abstract to this day little is known about thermal and rheological properties of the antarctic lithosphere we derive the effective elastic thickness t e as a proxy for these parameters by using ice thickness bedrock topography and a combination of new satellite and high resolution terrestrial gravity data cross spectral analysis based on the fan wavelet technique was employed to calculate t e variations by means of admittance and coherence techniques our results confirm a clear tectonic division of antarctica with predominantly high values in east antarctica eant t e 60 80 km and low values in west antarctica want t e 5 20 km for the transantarctic mountains separating these provinces we found t e to be around 10 km along the whole chain which is comparable to want apart from this general division we found fragmentation of the lithosphere within these provinces especially eant doesn t represent a single lithospheric block but shows strong variations of t e the highest values are found around the aurora subglacial basin t e 90 km and in dronning maud land t e 80 km the minimum value of t e within eant 15 km is found in the lambert graben such a low value can be associated with active rifting in the permian triassic strong localized erosion or possibly the effect of a cenozoic mantle plume according to the coherence calculations the weak zone extends to the gamburtsev subglacial mountains gsm showing a distinct decrease of t e to 25 30 km thus this weak channel divides the previously mentioned strong blocks however the admittance analysis gives relatively high values t e 70 km for the gsm based on the analysis of the wavelength dependent admittance and coherence results and misfits for several principal locations we give some preference to the coherence based values

nd sr isotopic composition of granulites and constraints on the evolution of the lower continental crust in a statistical study of granulite facies rocks we have analysed 32 samples with ages ranging from 2 900 to 200 myr for sm nd rb and sr and 143nd 144nd and 87sr 86sr ratios the sm nd ratio is found to be constant compared with the highly variable rb sr ratio using the model age formalism we show that in many cases internal differentiation of continental crust follows external differentiation with a large time interval

large scale crustal heterogeneities and lithospheric strength in cratons abstract the rheology and thermal structure of the continental lithosphere are intimately linked in old cratons the effective elastic thickness of the lithosphere has been estimated by various spectral inverse methods based on the correlation between topography and gravity anomalies estimates vary within a very large range from 40 km to 120 km depending on the method used in this paper we use forward models to account for lateral variations in mechanical properties and their effect on the equivalent elastic thickness eet of the lithosphere from these models which allow brittle elastic ductile rheologies and mechanical discontinuities faults we have calculated the strain stress distributions and displacement fields vertical integration of the stress permits a local determination of the effective elastic thickness the computed displacements were used to calculate related bouguer and free air gravity anomalies and compare them with the observations the analysis is applied to the 2000 ma kapuskasing uplift in the superior province of the canadian shield where the presence of a high density block in the upper crust is due to the upthrusting of midcrustal rocks along a major thrust fault the study shows that the stability of this structure on geologic time scales requires a strong lower crustal rheology a cold geotherm and the fault to be healed this study also shows that because of stress dependence of the non linear rheology crustal heterogeneities may cause significant 40 local reductions of the lithospheric strength away from the kapuskasing structure the average strength of the lithosphere remains high eet 100 km conventional methods for estimating the elastic thickness would not resolve such local strength reductions in cratons but would predict depending on the method used highly overestimated or instead underestimated eet

toward mapping the effective elastic thickness of planetary lithospheres from a spherical wavelet analysis of gravity and topography abstract the effective elastic thickness t e of the lithosphere controls the flexural response to transverse loading and can be used in conjunction with rheological models to remotely estimate surface heat flux of terrestrial planets in the vast majority of studies t e estimation is carried out in a two step process 1 the joint spectra admittance and or coherency of gravity anomalies free air and or bouguer and topography are calculated within finite size windows and 2 the spectra are inverted using a model for the loading of an infinite elastic plate or shell in recent years research in the spatio spectral analysis of cartesian grids and improvements in lithospheric loading models have allowed the mapping of t e on the earth at unprecedented resolution nevertheless the limitations imposed by working with cartesian data and models are hampering further advances in terrestrial t e studies the planetary community on the other hand has traditionally used spatio spectral methods that work directly on the sphere thereby avoiding the undesirable distortions and biases inherent in cartesian studies however the models and methods developed for the earth have never been applied to planetary data therefore also limiting further advances in the mapping of planetary t e this paper reviews the latest developments in t e studies and proposes to combine advances in both terrestrial and planetary studies to allow the mapping of t e of terrestrial planets using a spherical wavelet analysis of gravity and topography data we begin with a review of the recent literature on the challenges and debates concerning t e estimation from joint gravity and topography spectra we then briefly review the implementation of the continuous planar and spherical wavelet transforms cpwt and cswt and demonstrate that both transforms possess exactly the same resolving power however the cswt does not suffer from effects associated with non periodic boundaries we further re derive in a consistent manner the expressions for the admittance and coherency from flexural equations for the loading of thin elastic plates and shells and show that they result in similar spectra except at the longest wavelengths where the shell membrane stresses dominate we then estimate global grids of earth s continental t e by inverting the planar and spherical admittance and coherency functions both separately and jointly using either free air or bouguer gravity anomalies the correspondence between the cartesian and spherical approaches and the similarity of t e results for the earth s continents indicate that the spherical methods are robust results obtained from the joint inversion of admittance and coherency show that simple lithospheric loading models fail to capture the complexity of the data with adverse effects on the estimated parameters finally we extend the analysis to the moon and other terrestrial planets and discuss limitations and future applications of the fully spherical techniques

lithospheric flexure and bending of the central andes gravity anomaly and topography data are used to define the effective elastic thickness of the lithosphere t in the bend region of the central andes values of z increase from nearly zero north and south of the bend to values greater than 50 km at the bend in bolivia there is a close correlation between t and the style and magnitude of the shortening in the central andes since the late miocene in the bend region where the lithosphere is flexurally strong with large t foreland deformation is concentrated into a thin skinned fold and thrust belt above a basal decollement which has absorbed more than 100 km of shortening further north and south where the lithosphere is flexurally weak with low t foreland deformation is more complex involves basement and has absorbed less shortening the along strike gradients in foreland shortening have accommodated both clockwise and anticlockwise rotations about a vertical axis of almost the entire width of the bolivian andes we speculate that the observed variation in t is related to the proximity of the brazilian shield and has been an important factor in controlling the nature and amount of foreland deformation and hence bending of the central andes the flexural properties of the lithosphere may play an important role in determining the large scale evolution of mountain belts

isotopic constraints on pan african metamorphism in dronning maud land antarctica abstract garnet sm nd isotopic data are presented for selected samples from the metamorphic terrane of the h u sverdrupfjella western dronning maud land and yield pan african ages ranging from 680 to 415 ma reproducibility of the garnet data is outside analytical error but this does not affect the consistency of ages obtained the garnet ages are considerably younger than the inferred initial crystallization age based on petrographical and fabric analysis structural and whole rock and zircon isotopic data which support initial growth during the grenvillian orogeny 1200 1100 ma the garnet ages however are indistinguishable from a large number of rb sr mineral ages the possibility that the garnets remained above the blocking temperature until pan african exhumation is discounted polymetamorphism of the metamorphic terrane associated with both the grenbillian and pan african orogenes is favoured the garnet ages are interpreted as reset ages but the possibility that the garnets crystallized during the pan african event cannot be discounted in this case the data imply that the pan african orogeny attained lower granulite to amphibolite facies metamorphic conditions as indicated by geothermometry and geobarometry calculations involving garnet in either case the h u sverdupfjella area was subjected to significant pan african heating to temperatures of the order of 600 650 c

mechanical controls on the deformation of continents at convergent margins abstract spatial variations in the rigidity of continental plates expressed in terms of an effective elastic thickness t e can have a profound influence on the style of deformation of ocean continent convergent margins depending on the spatial distribution of t e strains related to plate boundary forces can become concentrated where t e is small we calculate t e and t e anisotropy in western canada by using and comparing the wavelet and multitaper coherence methods in addition to a nearly stepwise change in t e from the cordillera to the craton we show that weak axes of t e anisotropy are parallel with most compressive directions of horizontal stress components and fast axes of upper mantle seismic anisotropy maxima in the magnitude of t e anisotropy are spatially correlated with the locations of most earthquakes and the locations and directions of maxima in electrical anisotropy and conductivity the pattern of brittle failure and seismicity is explained as a response to plate boundary forces acting on a plate of variable rigidity and is expected to induce the observed mechanical anisotropy and enhance the flow of crustal fluids resulting in locally high electrical conductivities our combined results thus suggest for the first time that the elastic properties of continental lithosphere have a leading order influence on the deformation and evolution of convergent plate boundaries

temporal and spatial correlations between changes in plate motions and the evolution of rifted basins in africa we present the results of a backstripping study incorporating over 200 wells in 14 different basins or groups of basins located on the african interior or continental margins these results presented as mean tectonic subsidence rates averaged over appropriate periods are compared with the opening histories and changes in plate motions of the atlantic and indian oceans and the tethys mediterranean area for seven time steps from the late jurassic until present the results indicate a temporal and spatial correlation between phases of rapid subsidence in african basins and changes in plate motions and therefore are promising in terms of applicability of large scale plate motions in the studies of paleo stresses in sedimentary basins especially at times of initial rifting and formation of subduction zones reactivation of the basins appears to be primarily controlled by the orientation of the basin and underlying basement structures with respect to the stress direction the basins are preferably formed within weaker zones mostly pan african shear zones and the distance from the active plate boundary to the weak zone plays a minor role in whether or not it will be reactivated the presence of three important hot spots which were active during the early stages of break up of gondwana may have been important in preweakening the lithosphere at their sites this may have played an additional role in the localization of the basin deformation

a seismic refraction investigation of the archaean kaapvaal craton south africa using mine tremors as the energy source summary the structure of the central kaapvaal craton of southern africa has been investigated by deep seismic sounding using mine tremors as energy sources seismometers were deployed at approximately 10 km intervals on two profiles stretching between major mine tremor source regions mine tremors are rich in shear energy enabling joint interpretation of p and s waves and produce substantial energy at frequencies as low as 1 hz record sections are presented for both p and s waves and the traveltimes and amplitudes interpreted using 2 d ray tracing techniques synthetic seismograms computed for a 1 d velocity model by the reflectivity method compare well with the observed data a generalized seismic model of the kaapvaal craton has the following features supracrustal strata 0 10 km thick upper crystalline basement with p wave velocities of 6 0 6 2 km s the boundary between upper and lower crust at a depth of 14 18 km a lower crust with a relatively uniform seismic velocity in the range 6 4 6 7 kms and the crust mantle transition over 1 3 km with the moho at a depth of about 35 km the lower crust is found to be seismically attenuating and has a poisson s ratio of about 0 28 it is also known to be electrically conductive these observations are in accord with the presence of hydrated mantle rock at the base of the crust the velocity depth model of the kaapvaal craton is similar to models derived for other archaean cratons the proterozoic provinces adjacent to the kaapvaal craton are significantly thicker and have an intermediate to high velocity layer developed at the base of the crust this is interpreted to indicate a change in the process of crustal growth with basaltic underplating becoming more important since the archaean this change is attributed to a change in the composition of the upper mantle the higher temperatures in the archaean mantle led to the eruption of komatiitic lavas resulting in an ultradepleted mantle unable to produce significant volumes of basaltic melt proterozoic crust developed above fertile mantle and subsequent partial melting resulted in basaltic underplating and crustal inflation

40ar39ar thermochronological constraints on the structural evolution of the mesoproterozoic natal metamorphic province se africa abstract ten 40 ar 39 ar age spectra are presented for hornblende grains separated from mylonitized and weakly deformed amphibolites from the mesoproterozoic 1 2 1 0 ga natal metamorphic province nmp since the proposal of the sweat hypothesis the nmp has become a crucial area in which to study grenville aged locally termed namaquan accretion in this part of rodinia gondwana unlike many segments of the world s 1 1 ga belts the nmp is particularly suited to such studies since it is devoid of a high temperature pan african 500 ma overprint in this study we have dated hornblendes from within the earliest d1 ne directed thrust dominated structural domains of the belt the d1 domains are characterized by ne directed recumbent fold and thrust nappes and a pervasive generally s to sw dipping metamorphic foliation with down dip stretching lineations the new data constrain the minimum age of this early event which includes obduction of the northernmost tugela terrane onto the kaapvaal craton to 1135 9 ma in the d1 domains of the mzumbe terrane to the south cooling to below 550 c had only been attained by 1005 ma we also dated amphibolites from the later d2 structural domains which are characterized by sub vertical sinistral mylonite belts with sub horizontal to oblique stretching lineations our data show that d2 oblique shearing commenced at 1050 1035 ma in the mzumbe terrane and only terminated at 980 ma the youngest movements also included reactivation of major d1 structures such as the melville thrust mzumbe margate terrane boundary at 990 ma finally indications of minor pan african resetting was detected during the first 5 of the ar ar spectra from mylonites of the lilani matigulu shear zone tugela mzumbe terrane boundary indicating the polyphase nature of this major structure it has been suggested that the d1 event records the early ne sw directed arc continent collision history of the belt whilst the d2 event represents a continuation of essentially the same convergence vectors after extensive crustal thickening the new data place important time constraints on the major tectonic events in the nmp which appear comparable in many ways to other parts of the global grenvillian orogen

elastic thickness structure of south america estimated using wavelets and satellite derived gravity data abstract we used a wavelet formulation of the classical spectral isostatic analysis to invert satellite derived gravity and topography bathymetry for elastic thickness te over south america and its surrounding plates to provide a homogeneous representation of the gravity field for this vast region we corrected free air anomalies derived from a combination of terrestrial marine gravity data with data from the grace and champ satellite missions model eigen cg03c by a simple bouguer slab using a smoothed representation of surface relief wavelengths 125 km the resulting bouguer anomaly compares well with terrestrial data acquired in the central andes and allows te to be confidently estimated for values greater than 10 km the te map resolves regional scale features that are well correlated with known surface structures and shows maximum values of 100 15 km over the archean neoproterozoic core of the continent decreasing to less than 30 km around continental margins several regions of the oceanic plates and continental margins have an elastic thickness less than 10 km we performed a quantitative analysis by comparing the elastic thickness with the thermal structure predicted from the age of oceanic crust and igneous metamorphic rocks this demonstrates that oceanic plates have been weakened by thermal interaction with hotspots and locally by fracturing and hydration near the trench we observe that only the nucleus of the continent has resisted the thermomechanical weakening induced by the rifting of africa and south america along the passive margin and the andean orogeny along the active margin this latter region shows along strike variations in te that correlate with the geotectonic segmentation of the margin and with the pattern of crustal seismicity our results reveal that the rigidity structure follows the segmentation of the seismogenic zone along the subduction fault suggesting a causal relationship that should be investigated in order to improve the understanding and predictability of great earthquakes and tsunamis

estimates of te for continental regions using goce gravity satellite only gravity fields and surface gravity obtained from altimetric measurements now agree well at wavelengths greater than 180 km satellite gravity fields can therefore be used to estimate the elastic thickness tete in regions where surface observations are sparse they are used for this purpose in a number of continental regions of india africa and antarctica where the topography is sufficiently rough and also in regions of the usa china australia and siberia where there are surface measurements estimates of tete for antarctica depend on measurements of ice thickness which are now available for much of the continent values of tete are obtained using two methods from the admittance between the free air gravity and the topography and from the coherence between bouguer gravity anomalies and the topography the first but not the second gives values of tete that are everywhere less than the seismogenic thickness where there is sufficient topography estimates of tete from precambrian shields are all greater than 10 km and do not correlate with the lithospheric thickness they are probably are governed by variations in crustal heat generation rates values for regions strongly affected by phanerozoic tectonics are all less than 7 km and all such regions are underlain by thin lithosphere

elastic thickness of the himalayan tibetan orogen estimated from the fan wavelet coherence method and its implications for lithospheric structure abstract this paper is concerned with the spatial variation of the elastic thickness t e in the himalayan tibetan orogen and its implications for the understanding of lithospheric structure and deformation new t e maps of the himalayan tibetan orogen are generated from the new combined satellite terrestrial gravity eigen6c3stat and topography etopo1 models using the fan wavelet coherence technique the high t e values 60 km are observed in the indian shield and the tarim basin while the low t e values 40 km are prevailing over most of the tibetan plateau we also find that the t e distributions estimated using the high and low central wavenumber i e k 0 wavelets are different in southern tibet by combining constraints from the current seismic and thermo rheological modeling this difference may reflect that the strength of the lithosphere in southern tibet mainly resides in the lithospheric mantle within most parts of central and northern tibet the t e values are relatively low 30 km indicating that the entire lithosphere is weak our analysis finds that the t e variations are probably associated with changes in lithosphere structure we interpret the abrupt changes in t e between southern and northern tibet to indicate the location of the underthrusting strong indian lithosphere beneath tibet our results suggest that the northern limit of the underthrusting indian plate reaches as far north as the hindu kush and the southwestern margin of the tarim basin near 70 80 e and extends along the bangong nujiang suture in the central 80 87 e eastward between 87 e 93 e it may move to the indus tsangpo suture indicating a delamination of indian mantle lithosphere there further to the east it may underthrust northward beneath the eastern qiangtang block

an effective elastic thickness map of australia from wavelet transforms of gravity and topography using forsyth s method 1 we have developed a wavelet version of forsyth s coherence method for estimating the effective elastic thickness te of the lithosphere from gravity and topography we have previously shown that the fan wavelet is particularly well suited to making localised coherence estimates and here we progress the method by showing how the coherence can be modelled by using the wavelet transforms of gravity and topography to infer the initial loads that flex the plate the effectiveness of the method is demonstrated on synthetic data from a model having a rectangular area of large te embedded in a uniform low te surrounding and a load ratio that increases with wave number the results for the australia region show a core of high te under north and central australia with much lower values to the east and also unexpectedly under the western parts of the yilgarn and pilbara cratons

the tectonothermal evolution of the kirwanveggen h u sverdrupfjella areas dronning maud land antarctica abstract three episodes of deformation spanning a period of 900 ma are recognised the first deformation at 1000 ma involved progressive yet distinct stages within a protracted composite event involving recumbent folding low angle thrust faulting and locally highly oblique transpressive strike slip shearing these structures suggest tectonic transport from the south and southeast during d 1 d 2 at 500 ma is variable in the different areas and involved thrust faults and folding with locally developed axial planar foliations the orientations of the fault planes and axial planar structures suggest transport from the west and northwest in western sverdrupfjella and from the southeast in kirwanveggen d 3 involved normal faulting and jointing adjacent and parallel to the jutulstraumen glacier in the west the joints affect the alkaline complexes some of which are jurassic in age and consequently d 3 is related to the breakup of gondwana four phases of metamorphism related to the deformation are recognised the dominant mineral assemblages m 1 3 are typical of medium to high grade metamorphism discordant mafic intrusions provide evidence of a long history of metamorphism mafic nodules from the eastern part of the area contain high pressure assemblages representing m 1 assemblages and textures indicate that m 2 was related to isothermal decompression related to the uplift caused by thrust faulting during d 1 the period between m 2 and m 3 appears to have involved annealing at mid crustal levels m 3 mineral development is dominated by biotite which is oriented axial planar to d 2 folds m 4 assemblages are typically low grade and involve hydrothermal alteration resulting in chloritisation and sausseritisation related to d 3

flexural rigidity of the basin and range colorado plateau rocky mountain transition from coherence analysis of gravity and topography stochastic inversion for flexural loads and flexural rigidity of the continental elastic layer can be accomplished most effectively by using the coherence of gravity and topography however the spatial resolution of coherence analysis has been limited by use of two dimensional periodogram spectra from very large 105 km 2 windows that generally include multiple tectonic features using a two dimensional spectral estimator based on the maximum entropy method the spatial resolution of flexural properties can be enhanced by a factor of 4 or more enabling more detailed analysis at the scale of individual tectonic features this new approach is used to map the spatial variation of flexural rigidity along the basin and range transition to the colorado plateau and middle rocky mountains physiographic provinces large variations in flexural isostatic re sponse are found with rigidities ranging from as low as 8 7x102o n m elastic thickness t 4 6 km in the basin and range to as high as 4 1x1024 n m t 77 km in the middle rocky mountains these results compare favorably with independent determinations of flexural rigidity in the region areas of low flexural rigidity correlate strongly with areas of high surface heat flow as is expected from the contingence of flexural rigidity on a temperature dependent flow law also late cenozoic normal faults with large displacements are found primarily in areas of low flexural rigidity while deformation fronts of mesozoic tertiary overthrusts occur 0 to 100 km east of the low rigidity region the highest flexural rigidity is found within the archean wyoming craton where evidence suggests that deeply rooted cratonic lithosphere may play a role in deter mining the distribution of tectonism at the surface

on the recovery of effective elastic thickness using spectral methods examples from synthetic data and from the fennoscandian shield there is considerable controversy regarding the long term strength of continents te while some authors obtain both low and high te estimates from the bouguer coherence and suggest that both crust and mantle contribute to lithospheric strength others obtain estimates of only 25 km using the free air admittance and suggest that the mantle is weak at the root of this controversy is how accurately te can be recovered from coherence and admittance we investigate this question by using synthetic topography and gravity anomaly data for which te is known we show that the discrepancies stem from comparison of theoretical curves to multitaper power spectral estimates of free air admittance we reformulate the admittance method and show that it can recover synthetic te estimates similar to those recovered using coherence in light of these results we estimate te in fennoscandia and obtain similar results using both techniques te is 20 40 km in the caledonides 40 60 km in the swedish svecofennides 40 60 km in the kola peninsula and 70 100 km in southern karelia and svecofennian central finland independent rheological modeling using a xenolith controlled geotherm predicts similar high te in central finland because te exceeds crustal thickness in this area the mantle must contribute significantly to the total strength te in fennoscandia increases with tectonic age seismic lithosphere thickness and decreasing heat flow and low te correlates with frequent seismicity however in proterozoic and archean lithosphere the relationship of te to age is ambiguous suggesting that compositional variations may influence the strength of continents copyright 2004 by the american geophysical union

petrogenetic interpretation of granitoid rock series using multicationic parameters abstract granitoid rock compositions from a range of tectonic environments are plotted on a multicationic diagram devised by de la roche and his coworkers this shows that there is a systematic change through an orogenic cycle which leads progressively to the ultimate development of alkaline magmas possible source materials and mechanisms of magma generation are considered from analysis of mineral compositional vectors these suggest that most granitoid series result from a two stage process first fractional crystallisation of clinopyroxene olivine and calcic plagioclase from a basic source with tholeiitic affinities produces a magma of intermediate composition this magma then undergoes periodic mixing with a felsic magma followed by in situ fractionation to generate individual intrusions within granitoid series

relative importance of strain rate and rheology for the mode of continental extension summary both extension rate and rheology have been shown to influence the style of continental rifting so far their effect on the dynamics of extension has been discussed separately in the literature leading to diverging conclusions the rate of extension mostly affects the dynamics of rifting through the occurrence of syn rift cooling at low extension rates this cooling results in an increase of strength if the lithosphere has a temperature dependent rheology england 1983 first suggested that this effect will limit the amount of extension that an area may undergo kusznir park 1987 argued more generally that it will induce a widening of the rift and concluded that extension rate is the major control on wide versus narrow rifting later studies bassi 1991 bassi keen potter 1993 however have demonstrated the importance of rheological layering within the lithosphere for the mode of continental extension by showing that a plasticity dominated rheology will lead to rapid and narrow necking while a creep dominated rheology results in wider rifts and margins gravitational stresses arising from density anomalies due to lithosphere thinning also affect the style of rifting buck 1991 in this paper we examine the combined effect of these different parameters in order to reconcile earlier studies and assess the importance of syn rift cooling for the process of lithospheric necking the approach introduced in a previous study bassi 1991 uses a finite element technique to simulate extension of a vertical cross section of the lithosphere the effect of cooling on the necking pattern depends strongly on the rheology of the thinned lithosphere when it starts to cool if heat diffusion always induces strengthening and delays rupture in time it only modifies significantly the geometry of the rift when the upper mantle is weak and viscous in this case the locus of maximum strain rate migrates laterally once the central area starts to cool and harden as hypothesized by kusznir park 1987 eventually strain concentrates at the transition between deformed and undeformed lithosphere we predict that this pattern will induce asymmetric breakup and produce a very narrow margin and a wide uniformly thinned conjugate margin in all other cases i e when the upper mantle is initially in the low plasticity regime or if it reaches the yield stress during extension the rate of extension appears to have little effect on the rifting pattern

an assessment of the accuracy of admittance and coherence estimates using synthetic data previous work has shown that estimates of the admittance between topography and free air gravity anomalies are often biased by spectral leakage even after the application of multiple prolate spheroidal wavefunction data tapers despite this a number of authors who have used the free air admittance method to estimate the weighted average effective elastic thickness of the lithosphere te and to identify topography supported by mantle convection have not tested their methods using synthetic data with a known relationship between topography and gravity in this paper i perform a range of such tests using both synthetic surface data and synthetic line of sight los accelerations of satellites orbiting around an extra terrestrial planet it is found that spectral leakage can cause the estimated admittance and coherence to be significantly in error but only if the box in which they are estimated is too small the definition of small depends on the redness of the gravity spectrum there is minimal error in the whole box weighted average estimate of te if the admittance between surface gravity and topography is estimated within a box at least 3000 km wide when the synthetic uniform te is less than 20 km and the coherence is high the errors in te are mostly 5 km for all box sizes greater than 1000 km on the other hand when the true te is greater than 20 km and the box size is 1000 km the best fitting te is likely to be at least 5 10 km less than the true te however even when the coherence is high it is not possible to use elastic plate admittance models to distinguish between real and spurious small fractions of internal loading when the boxes are smaller than 2000 km in width noise in the gravity introduces error and uncertainty but no additional bias into the estimates of the admittance it does however bias estimates of te calculated using the coherence between bouguer gravity and topography the admittance at wavelengths between 1000 and 4000 km which is of interest when studying mantle convection is only well resolved when the box size is larger than 2000 km or the synthetic te is less than 15 km and the true long wavelength admittance is greater than 30 mgal km 1 when the box size is 1000 km it is not possible to distinguish between real and spurious convective support of long wavelength topography at the altitude of most orbiting satellites 200 400 km gravity is much redder than it is at ground level therefore it is necessary to use much larger boxes when using los accelerations to estimate the admittance than it is when using surface measurements however gradual changes in the altitude of the satellite or even occasional sudden changes make almost no difference to the estimate of the admittance finally three short investigations are undertaken concerning the effect on the admittance of the application of irregular windows to the data of lateral variations in te and of the infilling of flexural moats by low density sediment it is found that the bias due to the application of an irregular window is not significantly greater than the bias due to the application of a regular window of similar size that the best fitting te is strongly biased by the value associated with the highest amplitude topography and that sediment infill raises the admittance at wavelengths corresponding to the width of the moat

the effect of lower crustal flow on continental extension and passive margin formation the great variety of styles of continental extension may reflect different crustal thickness and thermal states of continental lithosphere during the initiation of rifting to investigate how these and other factors affect rifting and the development of passive continental margins we develop a simplified model of lithospheric extension we consider the evolution of extensional deformation for a three layer model lithosphere bounded laterally by much stronger lithosphere the cold part of the crust and mantle are treated as thin brittle plastic layers the lower crust is approximated as a thin viscous channel each brittle plastic layer can extend in only one location determined by the strength of the layer shear of the lower crust and buoyancy forces related to both crustal thickness variations and thermally induced density differences the lower crust flows in response to crustal thickness variations and is sheared when the loci of extension for the two brittle plastic layers are horizontally offset a situation we term shear decoupling as in previous studies we see three distinct patterns or modes of extensional deformation that occur under different sets of model parameters the core complex mode the wide rift mode and the narrow rift mode shear decoupling occurs only in cases with a crustal rheology at the weak end of the spectrum of laboratory estimated values we are aware of no observations that require that the upper crust and upper mantle strain at laterally displaced positions we show that for large magnitudes of extension there can be transitions between modes as inferred for some highly extended continental areas predicted patterns of crustal thickness and heat flow for some models are similar to observations at several rifted continental margins including very wide and asymmetric margins

palaeomagnetism of palaeozoic peel sandstones and langness conglomerate formation isle of man implications for the age and regional diagenesis of manx red beds

a reassessment of spectral te estimation in continental interiors the case of north america 1 conventional spectral te studies use the real part of the admittance between gravity anomalies and topography or alternatively the square of the magnitude of the coherency i e coherence here we show the utility of treating both the admittance and coherency as complex quantities inverting the real parts to estimate te we use the imaginary parts to tell if the inversion is biased by noise one method inverts the square of the real coherency with the internal to total load ratio f derived as a function of wave number directly from the gravity and topography the other method inverts the real part of the admittance assuming that f is wave number independent we test the methods using synthetic elastic plate models loaded at the surface and moho in such a way that the final relief is the actual north american topography in some of the models we add gravity noise generated by a model having both surface and internal loads such that the final topography is zero and find that both methods are susceptible to noise application of the two methods to north america gives te maps showing substantial agreement except in regions affected by noise but these are not a dominant part of the total area given the suggested mechanisms by which noise might arise it is not surprising that it is not a more widespread feature of the north american craton importantly both methods show that large parts of the canadian shield are characterized by te 100 km

mapping the mechanical anisotropy of the lithosphere using a 2d wavelet coherence and its application to australia abstract we develop a new method for imaging the spatial variations of the anisotropy of the flexural response of the lithosphere and apply it to recent topographic and gravity data sets over australia the method uses two dimensional morlet wavelet transforms superposed in a strictly controlled geometry to estimate the auto and cross spectra of the two data sets in a number of different directions the resulting wavelet coherence is a function of scale or wavelength as well as orientation and is inverted at each spatial location for the three parameters of an anisotropic thin elastic plate model i e maximum and minimum flexural rigidities and the orientation of the maximum extensive tests of the method on synthetic anisotropic but uniform data sets show that it retrieves the amplitude and orientation of the anisotropy with useful accuracy the results for australia west of 143 e show a strong correlation with the shallower layers 75 175 km of a recent model of seismic sv wave azimuthal anisotropy the weak axes i e of minimum flexural rigidity in most cases are approximately at right angles to the fast axes of the seismic anisotropy implying that for precambrian australia they arise from the same source this is most likely deformation resulting from the most recent episode of orogeny

spatial variations of the effective elastic thickness te using multitaper spectral estimation and wavelet methods examples from synthetic data and application to south america 1 improved recovery of the spatial variability in the effective elastic thickness te of the lithosphere is important to interpret earth s structure and geodynamics here we use synthetic topography and gravity data to systematically compare the recovery of te using the multitaper windowing scheme of perez gussinye et al 2004 2007 with the wavelet approach of kirby and swain 2008 we find that spuriously high te estimates previously present in synthetic tests with the multitaper are artifacts arising from fourier transform edge effects introduced by splitting the data into land and ocean areas prior to load deconvolution hence we adopt the mixed land ocean loading scheme of kirby and swain 2008 using this approach we find that underestimation of te when the transitional wavelength approaches the window size is largely related to the limited size of the analysis window and not to random correlations of initial loading surfaces as occurs in the wavelet method to attenuate this bias we apply a correction factor to our resulting multitapered te and find that this technique more accurately recovers steep te gradients and small scale te anomalies than the wavelet method finally we recalculate te of south america using the multitaper and the mixed land ocean approach the new te distribution is very similar to that of perez gussinye et al 2007 2008 suggesting that fourier transform edge effects are less severe in the real earth than in synthetic data this difference arises because coastlines are much less rough in the real earth than in our synthetic data on the basis of the synthetic results we interpret that most of the small scale features present in the multitaper but not in wavelet te estimates of south america presented by tassara et al 2007 are real these include high te over the andean flat subduction zones and low te along the dyke swarms of the parana flood basalts the tacutu graben and amazonian basin

himalayan tibetan analogies for the evolution of the zimbabwe craton and limpopo belt abstract the limpopo orogeny which lasted from 2700 to 2600 ma was characterised by nnw sse directed shortening this resulted in both crustal thickening accommodated by folding and nnw directed thrusting and associated crustal extrusion whereby a number of crustal blocks including the central zone of the limpopo belt was displaced to the west southwest along wsw ene trending shear zones this was part of a regionally distributed phase of orogenic deformation which affected the adjoining kaapvaal and zimbabwe cratons from the witwatersrand basin in the south to the harare greenstone belt in the north this deformation which migrated northwards with time postdated an earlier phase of crustal accretion during which the archaean crustal unit now marked by the kaapvaal and zimbabwe cratons and the limpopo belt grew towards the north northwest shortening of this unit during the limpopo orogeny may be regarded as the last stage of the crustal accretion process this tectonic process of continental growth by accretion followed by crustal shortening with associated crustal extrusion has many features in common with tibetan tectonics from the mesozoic to the present

a re assessment of focal depth distributions in southern iran the tien shan and northern india do earthquakes really occur in the continental mantle summary we investigate the depth distribution of earthquakes within the continental lithosphere of southern iran the tien shan and northern india by using synthetic seismograms to analyse p and sh body waveforms in the zagros mountains of southern iran earthquakes are apparently restricted to the upper crust depths of 20 km whereas in the tien shan and northern india they occur throughout the thickness of the continental crust to depths of 40 45 km we find no convincing evidence for earthquakes in the continental mantle of these regions in spite of previous suggestions to the contrary and question whether seismicity in the continental mantle is important in any part of the world in some regions such as iran the aegean tibet and california seismicity is virtually restricted to the upper continental crust whereas in others including parts of east africa the tien shan and northern india the lower crust is also seismically active although usually less so than the upper crust such variations cannot reliably be demonstrated from published catalogue or bulletin locations even from ones in which depth resolution is generally improved in contrast to the oceanic mantle lithosphere in which earthquakes certainly occur the continental mantle lithosphere is we suggest virtually aseismic and may not be significantly stronger than the lower continental crust these variations in continental seismogenic thickness are broadly correlated with variations in effective elastic thickness suggesting that the strength of the continental lithosphere resides in the crust and require some modification to prevalent views of lithosphere rheology

average lithospheric structure of southern africa summary we present a new 1 d earth model for the crust and upper mantle beneath the archaean core of southern africa the crustal structure is constrained by published seismic refraction reflection data and by the modelling of teleseismic receiver function data the mantle structure is constrained by traveltime measurements for p and s waves by waveform inversion of multimode surface waves and by forward modelling of p waveforms for regional earthquakes the 42 km thick crust of southern africa consists of four layers a 2 km thick 5 05 km s surface layer a 5 km thick 6 08 km s upper crust a 20 km thick 6 30 km s l mid crust and a 15 km thick 6 73 km s lower crust below the crust there is an 80 km thick upper mantle lid v and v are 8 09 and 4 62 km s l respectively at the top of the lid and the compressional and shearvelocity gradients through the lid are 0 0008 s l and 0 0013 s respectively below the lid there is a substantial shear wave lvz with the shear wave velocity dropping from 4 72 km s l in the lower part of the lid to 4 32 km s at 250 km depth the shear wave lvz is required to fit both the v measurements and the regional surface waveforms forward modelling of p suggests that no upper mantle p wave lvz exists there is an increase in the p wave velocity gradient at 125 km depth to 0 0015 s and a second increase at 250 km depth to 0 0035 s velocities and densities in the seismic model of the lid agree closely with velocity and density estimates from the geochemical analysis of garnet periodotite nodules from kimberlites of the kaapvaal craton implying that the estimates from kirnberlites are representative of a wider region of the archaean core of southern africa not just of the restricted region beneath which the kimberlites are found a comparison of the southern african seismic model with seismic models for other shield regions where nodule data are not available shows that the nodule results may also be representative of the upper mantle in those regions

strength and rheology of the western u s cordillera effective elastic thickness te depends primarily on temperature composition and state of stress of the lithosphere in this paper we examine high resolution spectral estimates of te and their relationships to regional heat flow age of the lithosphere seismic properties stress orientations and earthquake focal depths of the western u s cordillera the relationship of te to heat flow indicates that ductile flow accommodates long term 106 to 108 years isostatic response at different levels of the crust and upper mantle depending principally on age and by implication bulk composition of the lithosphere isostatic response is primarily controlled by the upper mantle in archean lithosphere of the middle rocky mountains whereas te depends on lower crustal flow in early proterozoic lithosphere of the colorado plateau the yellowstone snake river plain volcanic field and significantly extended regions in the basin range and northern rocky mountains are associated with latest proterozoic aged lithosphere and indicate middle to upper crustal control of long term te we also show that azimuthal variations of te reflect deviatoric stress in the lithosphere te is found empirically to approximate the 95th percentile focal depth of background seismicity the latter relationship is inconsistent with brittle ductile control of focal depth indicating that another rheological transition e g from stick slip to stable sliding frictional behavior is responsible tectonic and structural relationships expand upon the hypothesis that the geographic distribution of tectonic features depends fundamentally on spatial variations in strength of the lithosphere moreover we find a spatial correlation of the intermountain seismic belt to a marked transition in te implying that forces responsible for this active seismic zone are derived from local buoyancy anomalies rather than from current day plate boundary interactions

pb nd and sr isotope mapping of grenville age crustal provinces in rodinia new pb nd and sr isotope data are presented for geochemically similar 1 1 1 2 ga granitoids and tonalitic granitic orthogneisses from antarctica southern africa and the falkland islands and adjoining plateau areas originally within the supercontinents of rodinia and gondwana these data support contentions for the presence of a mesoproterozoic 1 2 ga destructive plate margin running from namaqua natal southern africa through the displaced microplates of the falkland plateau and falkland islands the haag nunatak crustal block west antarctica and into western dronning maud land east antarctica the bulk of these granitoids represent juvenile mesoproterozoic additions to the crust except for in parts of east antarctica i e the sverdrupfjella where older paleoproterozoic or archean crust was involved in granitoid generation our isotope data permit plate reconstructions in which southern africa east antarctica and the falkland islands and plateau were adjacent within rodinia

crustal structure beneath southern africa and its implications for the formation and evolution of the kaapvaal and zimbabwe cratons the formation of archean crust appears to in volve processes unique to early earth history initial results from receiver function analysis of crustal structure beneath 81 broadband stations deployed across southern africa re vealsignicantdierences inthenatureof thecrustandthe crust mantle boundary between archean and post archean geologic terranes with the notable exception of the colli sional limpopo belt where the crust is thick and the moho complex the crust beneath undisturbed archean craton is typically thin 35 40 km unlayered and characterized byastrongvelocitycontrastacrossarelativelysharpmoho thiscrustalstructurecontrastsmarkedlywiththatbeneath post archeanterranesandbeneatharcheanregionsaected bylarge scaleproterozoicevents thebushveldcomplexand the okwa magondi belts where the crust tends to be rel atively thick 45 50 km and the moho is complex

geochemistry and isotopic evolution of the mesoproterozoic cape meredith complex west falkland whole rock major and trace element geochemical and rb sr sm nd isotopic data are presented for the mesoproterozoic 1 0 ga metamorphic and igneous rocks of the cape meredith complex west falkland the data indicate that the oldest rocks the 1 1 ga supracrustal gneisses of the big cape formation which form three petrographic and geochemical groups mafic amphibolite quartz plagioclase biotite hornblende intermediate gneiss and acid gneiss probably represent a juvenile calc alkaline basalt andesite rhyolite volcanic sequence with epsilon endt values and nd t dm ages of 3 to 6 and 1100 to 1400 ma respectively it is argued on geochemical grounds that these metavolcanics were extruded in an island arc at around 1120 ma the big cape formation was intruded by granitoids during and after a collisional orogenic event at around 1090 ma the oldest foliated g1 granodiorite was emplaced as thin sheets at approximately 1090 to 1070 ma and is characterized by end values of 1 5 to 4 t dm 1200 to 1400 ma showing its juvenile nature the 1070 ma g2 syntectonic granitoid gneisses and 1000 ma g3 post tectonic granites also exhibit juvenile characteristics e nd 0 to 5 and t dm 2200 to 1200 ma respectively the granitoids show a time composition evolution from na rich g1 granodiorite to potassic high high field strength element granites g3 the geochemical and isotopic characteristics and geological evolution of the cape meredith complex is comparable with that of the adjacent gondwana crustal blocks in natal se africa and dronning maud land east antarctica supporting models that demonstrate these areas evolved in a contiguous juvenile arc environment prior to and during a major orogenic event at 1 1 ga these events were associated with the birth of the rodinian supercontinent the three areas remained juxtaposed during rodinia break up and were subsequently incorporated into gondwana in the same relative positions

effective elastic thickness and mechanical anisotropy of south china and surrounding regions abstract south china and surrounding regions extend from the eastern tibetan plateau through the tectonically stable sichuan basin and the broad mesozoic magmatic and fold belt to the trench arc basin system in the western pacific which provide an ideal place to study deformation of the continental lithosphere under long term magmatism and oceanic subduction we obtained the effective elastic thickness t e and its anisotropy of south china and surrounding regions from the analysis of coherence between topography and satellite gravity using wavelet methods the t e values of the study area vary from 2 to 75 km with relatively low t e values 30 km along the tectonic boundaries the north south gravity lineament nsgl and seismic zones and in the regions with high surface heat flow the evenly low t e values in the lower yangtze region and the cathaysia block can be attributed to the long lived subduction of the paleo tethys and the paleo pacific ocean basins beneath the south china block scb the nsgl in the scb may separate the unmodified high t e and thermally weakened low t e continental lithosphere due to oceanic subduction despite different distances to the tectonic boundaries earthquakes occur more frequently in regions with t e values of 10 30 km implying strain concentration in the low t e regions a positive correlation between seismic activity and the magnitude of t e anisotropy suggests that a highly anisotropic mechanical structure will promote strain localization and brittle failure in the lithosphere the poor correlation between the weak axis of t e anisotropy and the dynamic indicators of the present tectonic regime the shear wave splitting direction the maximum horizontal compressive stress direction confirms that t e anisotropy mainly reflects tectonic inheritance of the continental lithosphere

litholog and structure of the grenville aged 1 1 ga basement of heimefrontfjella east antarctica the heimefrontfjella mountains western dronning maud land east antarctica are dominantly composed of grenville aged 1 1 ga rocks which were reworked during the pan african orogeny at 500 ma three discontinuity bounded grenville aged terranes have been recognized namely from north to south the kottas sivorg and vardeklettane terranes the terranes contain their own characteristic lithological assemblages although each is made up of an early supracrustal sequence of metavolcanic and or metasedimentary gneisses intruded by various predominantly granitoid suites no older basement upon which the protoliths of these older gneisses were deposited has been recognized in each terrane the older layered gneisses were intruded by various plutonic suites ranging in age from 1150 to 1000 ma the vardeklettane terrane is characterized by abundant charnockites and two pyroxene granulite facies parageneses in metabasites whereas the sivorg and kottas terranes were metamorphosed to amphibolite facies grade p t estimates show that peak metamorphic conditions changed from 600 c at 8 kbar in the south to 700 c at 4 kbar in the northern sivorg terrane regional greenschist retrogression of high grade assemblages may be of pan african age the heimefrontfjella terranes were juxtaposed and pervasively deformed during a complex and protracted period of e w collision orogenesis in a transpressive regime at 1 1 ga this is manifest as early gently dipping thrust related shear fabrics d1 succeeded by the initiation of an important d2 steep dextral shear zone heimefront shear zone hsz during which the early fabrics and structures were steepened and rotated in an anticlockwise sense the hsz is a curvilinear structure which changes from a dextral oblique strike slip lateral ramp in the north to a steep dip slip frontal ramp in the south where it forms the boundary between the sivorg and vardeklettane terranes the pan african event is manifested as discrete low to medium temperature ductile to brittle shears d3 and numerous k ar cooling ages

new constraints on the origin of the hawaiian swell from wavelet analysis of the geoid to topography ratio abstract analyzing the formation mechanism of hotspot swells enhances our understanding of intraplate volcanism and the underlying geodynamical processes the two main hypotheses for the origin of the archetypal hawaiian swell are thermal lithospheric thinning and dynamic support by an ascending plume any successful model would have to be able to simultaneously explain the swell topography and the corresponding geoid anomaly in simple models of isostatic compensation the geoid to topography ratio gtr is linearly related to the depth of the compensating mass therefore it is often considered a fundamental parameter to assess swell support mechanisms previous estimates for the geoid to topography ratio gtr of the hawaiian swell however are biased towards low values by incomplete removal of the effects of volcanic loading and lithospheric flexure in order to resolve these issues we here apply a continuous wavelet transform which allows resolution of lateral variations of the gtr at various spatial scales in a series of synthetic tests the robustness of this approach and its power to identify the origin of hotspot swells are established with 8 m km on the youngest part of the chain the recovered gtr agrees well with the predictions for dynamic support therefore ruling out thermal rejuvenation as an important mechanism we also find that the depth of the compensating mass decays by 20 km over a distance of 500 km from hawaii to kauai and identify sublithospheric erosion by small scale convection in the ponded plume material as a viable mechanism to support this decay

thin elastic shells with variable thickness for lithospheric flexure of one plate planets summary planetary topography can either be modelled as a load supported by the lithosphere or as a dynamic effect due to lithospheric flexure caused by mantle convection in both cases the response of the lithosphere to external forces can be calculated with the theory of thin elastic plates or shells on one plate planets the spherical geometry of the lithospheric shell plays an important role in the flexure mechanism so far the equations governing the deformations and stresses of a spherical shell have only been derived under the assumption of a shell of constant thickness however local studies of gravity and topography data suggest large variations in the thickness of the lithosphere in this paper we obtain the scalar flexure equations governing the deformations of a thin spherical shell with variable thickness or variable young s modulus the resulting equations can be solved in succession except for a system of two simultaneous equations the solutions of which are the transverse deflection and an associated stress function in order to include bottom loading generated by mantle convection we extend the method of stress functions to include loads with a toroidal tangential component we further show that toroidal tangential displacement always occurs if the shell thickness varies even in the absence of toroidal loads we finally prove that the degree one harmonic components of the transverse deflection and of the toroidal tangential displacement are independent of the elastic properties of the shell and are associated with translational and rotational freedom while being constrained by the static assumption degree one loads can deform the shell and generate stresses the flexure equations for a shell of variable thickness are useful not only for the prediction of the gravity signal in local admittance studies but also for the construction of stress maps in tectonic analysis

directional wavelet analysis on the sphere application to gravity and topography of the terrestrial planets 1 the spectral relations admittance and correlation between gravity and topography are often used to obtain information on the density structure flexural support and heat flow of planetary lithospheres mapping spatial variations in these quantities requires spatiospectral analysis techniques here we describe the application of a directional continuous spherical wavelet transform using a wavelet basis constructed from the superposition of azimuthally adjacent complex morlet wavelets in a manner similar to the fan wavelet developed in the plane the method is applied to gravity and topography of the earth venus mars and the moon the wavelet coefficients are used to compute isotropic and directional wavelet autospectra and cross spectra which are then combined to form the admittance and correlation functions the resulting maps offer insights into lithospheric structure of the terrestrial planets in particular we show that the earth and venus have uniformly low positive admittance and high correlation whereas mars and the moon display hemispherical contrasts with large negative and anisotropic coefficients coinciding with lowlands as has long been known the two largest impact basins in the inner solar system the south pole aitken basin on the moon and the hellas basin on mars display low positive admittance and high correlation indicating isostatic compensation in contrast most other impact basins particularly the martian and lunar mascons show negative coefficients at low wavelet degrees suggesting flexural support by a strong lithosphere these results imply that although simple isotropic flexural models can account for most observations future models may need to incorporate anisotropy as an additional parameter

three dimensional subsidence analysis and gravity modelling of the continental margin offshore namibia summary seismic re ection pro les and gravity anomaly data have been used to determine the structure and evolution of the namibian continental margin in comparison to other margins the gravity anomaly at the namibian margin shows a number of distinctive features it lacks an oishore gravity low and despite the presence of up to 9 km of sediments the gravity high is displaced landwards of the maximum sediment thickness in an attempt to explain these features the early cretaceous recent stratigraphic record is analysed using a combined 3 d backstripping and gravity modelling technique that enables constraints to be placed on the long term mechanical properties of the lithosphere a neutral depth of necking and a relatively high exural rigidity or equivalent elastic thickness te o f 25 km can explain part of the anomaly at least in the south of the margin however large residual anomalies exist that can be reduced by the presence of pre rift low density sediments within the zone of maximum stretching south of 22 0 s high density volcanic material at the eastern pinch out of the lower rift sequence and a lateral sediment density variation across the shelf slope and rise in addition the presence of a magmatic body at the base of the crust provided that the exural strength of the margin is high signi cantly improves the t between observed and calculated gravity anomalies recovered stretching factors enable predictions of the geometry of the moho to be made palaeobathymetry is estimated along the entire margin through time by comparing the subsidence determined from backstripping to that predicted by simple models of rifting these estimates are within the errors of observed palaeowater depths where well control exists the requirement of high te rather than te that increases with time suggests that stretched continental crust extends oishore for some distance and the continent ocean boundary occurs in relatively deep water near magnetic anomaly m4 reconstruction of the gravity eld of the south atlantic at 100 ma illustrates that in terms of their gravity signature the south atlantic margins are asymmetric

isostatic response of the australian lithosphere estimation of effective elastic thickness and anisotropy using multitaper spectral analysis gravity and topography provide important insights regarding the degree and mechanisms of isostatic compensation the azimuthally isotropic coherence function be tween the bouguer gravity anomaly and topography evolves from high to low for increasing wavenumber a diagnostic that can be predicted for a variety of lithospheric loading models and used in inversions for flexural rigidity thereof in this study we investigate the isostatic response of continental australia we consider the effects of directionally anisotropic plate strength on the coherelce the anisotropic coherence function is calculated for regions of australia that have distinctive geological and geophysical properties the coherence estimation is performed by the thomson multiple slepian taper spectral analysis method extended to two dimensional fields our analysis reveals the existence of flexural anisotropy in central australia indicative of a weaker n s direction of lower te this observation is consistent with the suggestion that the parallel faults in that area act to make the lithosphere weaker in the direction perpendicular to them it can also be related to the n s direction of maximum stress and possibly the presence of e w running zones weakened due to differential sediment burial rates we also demonstrate that the multitaper method has distinct advantages for computing the isotropic coherence function the ability to make many independent estimates of the isostatic response that are minimally affected by spectral leakage results in a coherence that is more robust than with modified periodogram methods particularly at low wavenumbers our analysis elucidates the reasons for discrepancies in previous estimates of effective elastic thickness te of the australian lithosphere in isotropic inversions for te we obtain values that are as much as a factor of 2 less than those obtained in standard inversions of the periodogram coherence using bouguer gravity and topography but greater than those obtained by inversions that utilize free air rather than bouguer gravity and ignore the presence of subsurface loads however owing to the low spectral power of the australian topography the uncertainty on any estimate of te is substantial

formation of an archaean continent about 30 of the earth is covered by continents but only about 10 small kernels of these continentsae known as archaean cratonsae are continental fragments formed before 2 5 gyr ago the kaapvaal craton of south africa which formed and stabilized between 3 7 and 2 7 gyr ago is one of the oldest reasonably sized examples of these continental fragments it consists of a mosaic of subdomains that have been welded together by processes similar to those of modern day plate tectonics the earliest subdomains may have owed their origin to the onset of efficient recycling from the earth s hydrosphere into the mantle

wavelet analysis of the coherence between bouguer gravity and topography application to the elastic thickness anisotropy in the canadian shield summary we use a wavelet transform to compute the local and azimuthal variations of the coherence between bouguer gravity and topography in eastern canada the isotropic coherence is calculated by averaging the wavelet spectra from optimally overlapping 2 d morlet wavelets having an isotropic spectral envelope in adjacent directions within 180 defining the so called fan wavelet the isotropic wavelet coherence spectrum is inverted to obtain local estimates of the elastic thickness te of the lithosphere we calculate the anisotropic coherence by restricting the fan wavelet over an azimuthal range of 90 the direction of maximum coherence is diagnostic of the direction of preferred isostatic compensation or the direction where the lithosphere is weakest the coherence is inverted using the theoretical response of a thin anisotropic plate model we have carried out extensive tests on synthetic topography and bouguer gravity data sets to verify that 1 the wavelet method can recover te for simple models with either homogeneous or spatially variable rigidity patterns and that 2 the method can determine azimuthal variations in the 2 d coherence for homogeneous models with anisotropic te we have used data from the eastern canadian shield to infer the variations in te and the anisotropy of the coherence the relative variations in te show trends similar to those obtained in previous studies that used different spectral methods the wavelet transform gives te values between 30 and 120 km te is generally high 80 km throughout eastern canada lower values 30 60 km are found in the eastern grenville province in the northern appalachians and in the superior province in the great lakes region the high values found in hudson bay are consistent with previous studies of elastic thickness and models of basin subsidence the direction of maximum coherence obtained from the wavelet method is also consistent with our previous results obtained with the multitaper method and shows that the weak mechanical axis is perpendicular to the fast seismic axis where seismic anisotropy has been detected

wavelet transform mapping of effective elastic thickness and plate loading validation using synthetic data and application to the study of southern african tectonics 1 we present a new wavelet transform method to map spatial variations in effective elastic thickness te and plate loading ratio f the method assumes a model of thin plate flexural isostasy to describe the mechanical response of the lithosphere to vertical loading in this model the rheological properties of the lithosphere are aggregated into the effective elastic thickness te of an equivalent thin plate overlying an inviscid fluid a number of methods have been developed to map spatial variations in te in an attempt to assess regional patterns of flexural strength our new method first obtains local coherence and local admittance through wavelet cross spectral analysis of surface topography and bouguer gravity anomaly wavelet coherence is used to obtain the local characteristic wavelength which is a function of both te and the degree of relative loading f of the plate by subsurface loads and surface loads loading is the combined effect of erosion sedimentation intrusion faulting and metamorphism wavelet admittance in a normalized form is used to resolve this f te ambiguity and maps are made of the spatial variations in te and f we carry out extensive tests of the wavelet method on simulated topography and bouguer gravity anomaly data that we generate through finite difference simulations of flexural isostasy with spectrally realistic loads and simple spatial variations in te these tests demonstrate that the wavelet inversion method is reasonably robust to uncertainties in loading and in crustal thickness and is able to recover te to within 25 50 of its correct value we apply the wavelet method to southern africa and recover estimates of te principally in the range 25 50 km in good agreement with existing estimates from forward modeling and fourier coherence analyses we find that our te estimates often exceed estimates of crustal thickness pointing to a strong upper mantle in parts of southern africa

constraints on extension of continental lithosphere the extension of the continental lithosphere is considered in terms of the deformation of a thin viscous sheet with a temperature dependent rheology which is governed primarily by the strength of the upper mantle the lithosphere is subjected either to a constant strain rate or to a strain rate decreasing with time corresponding to the stretching of a region of fixed volume with a constant velocity boundary condition the progress of the extension is influenced by the decrease in strength of the lithosphere owing to its attenuation and by an increase in strength resulting from cooling the relative importance of these two effects depends on two parameters a dimensionless strain rate and the total strain for a given strain rate the extending lithosphere goes through two phases as the strain increases in the first the effect of thinning the lithosphere is predominant and the average strength of the lithosphere remains close to and perhaps slightly below its original strength in the second the effect of cooling of the lithosphere leads to very rapid increase in strength as a function of strain resulting presumably in an effective limit on the degree of stretching that the lithosphere experiences for the case of strain rate decreasing with time when the initial strain rates are of order 10 15s 1 this maximum extension is between 100 and 150 for a strain rate of 10 l4 s 1 the maximum lies around 400 to 500 at higher strain rates than this very large extension may occur before cooling significantly affects the strength of the lithosphere this model accords well with the constraints available from the continental margins of the north atlantic

isotope and geochemical constraints on proterozoic crustal evolution in south eastern africa proterozoic exposures south of the imbricate thrust terrane in the eastern sector of the namaqua natal belt of southern africa are dominated by granitoid plutons intrusive into older supracrustal gneisses many of these granites have geochemical characteristics similar to a type and rapakivi suites as previously described in australia and the northern hemisphere ages obtained from the natal units range from 1 1 to 0 88 ga nd tdm values cluster about 1 4 ga the oldest granitoids have volcanic arc chemical signatures but subsequent to 1 1 ga a type granites are common this suggests a change in tectonic environment or melting process at about this time initial 87sr 86sr ratios and nd values for the older suites approach values normally associated with a depleted mantle reservoir whilst values are similar to those found in orogen environments these data clearly indicate that the proterozoic crust of south eastern africa was not derived by extensive reactivation of archaean or early proterozoic protoliths low 87sr 86sr ratios in metasedimentary carbonates and 1 8 ga nd tdm ages for metapelites from the belt support this model and preclude the formation of the belt in an intracratonic setting all the data thus support models involving substantial crustal accretion and differentiation primarily subsequent to 1 5 ga

effective elastic thickness along the conjugate passive margins of india madagascar and antarctica a re evaluation using the hermite multitaper bouguer coherence application abstract gondwana correlation studies had rationally positioned the western continental margin of india wcmi against the eastern continental margin of madagascar ecmm and the eastern continental margin of india ecmi against the eastern antarctica continental margin eacm this contribution computes the effective elastic thickness te of the lithospheres of these once conjugated continental margins using the multitaper bouguer coherence method the results reveal significantly low strength values te 2 km in the central segment of the wcmi that correlate with consistently low te values 2 3 km obtained throughout the entire marginal length of the ecmm this result is consistent with the previous te estimates of these margins and confirms the idea that the low te segments in the central part of the wcmi and along the ecmm represents paleo rift inception points of the lithospheric margins that was thermally and mechanically weakened by the combined action of the marion hotspot and lithospheric extension during the rifting the uniformly low te value 2 km along the eacm indicates a mechanically weak lithospheric margin probably due to considerable stretching of the lithosphere considering the fact that this margin remained almost stationary throughout its rift history in contrast the ecmi has comparatively high te variations 5 11 km that lack any correlation with the regional tectonic setting using gravity forward and inversion applications we find a leading order of influence of sediment load on the flexural properties of this marginal lithosphere the study concludes that the thick pile of the bengal fan sediments in the ecmi masks and has erased the signal of the original load induced topography and its gravity effect has biased the long wavelength part of the observed gravity signal the hence uncorrelated flat topography and deep lithospheric flexure together contribute a bias in the flexure modeling which likely accounts a relatively high te estimate

global and local isostatic coherence from the wavelet transform 1 a method to compute the variations in lithospheric elastic thickness te has been developed using the wavelet transform the technique which uses a superposition of two dimensional morlet wavelets in a geometry named a fan wavelet is designed to yield isotropic yet complex wavelet coefficients for the co and cross spectra of gravity and topography data these are then used to compute a spatially varying isostatic coherence from which both global and local estimates may be obtained we applied the method to synthetic gravity and topography generated for a thin elastic plate of uniform thickness 20 km yielding an apparent spatially variable te of 24 5 3 5 km the estimated global coherence for this model appears to fit the theoretical prediction as well as fourier transform based estimates and is smoother than these we also computed the wavelet coherence and hence spatially varying te for a plate of non uniform thickness yielding a difference with the model of 2 0 1 7 km

wavelet and multitaper coherence methods for assessing the elastic thickness of the irish atlantic margin summary there have been some inconsistencies in estimates of the effective elastic thickness of the continental lithosphere te based upon admittance or coherence relationships between gravity and topography this paper compares multitaper and wavelet methods to analyse the coherence between bouguer gravity and bathymetric data over the irish atlantic margin the analyses show that similar lateral te variations can be recovered from the data but demonstrate that the size of the data window can give rise to a significant downward bias in te estimates a seismically constrained 3 d gravity inversion over the rockall basin shows the presence of surface and subsurface loads whose ratio is loosely correlated with load ratio variations generated from the wavelet coherence method the te and load ratio f variations can be plausibly related to major geological structures on the margin if the load ratio variations can be interpreted geologically it implies that spectral based methods to estimate effective elastic thickness must incorporate subsurface loads within the underlying theoretical model on the irish atlantic margin te is generally low 6 18 km and is associated with a ne sw caledonian trend the weakest lithosphere is in the southern rockall basin porcupine bank and porcupine basin and the strongest lithosphere is along the rockall hatton region the low te values are consistent with results from other passive margins the reasons for such low te values on the irish atlantic margin remain unclear but may be the consequence of te being frozen into the lithosphere when loads were emplaced during continental breakup and temperature gradients were high the process of sedimentation and the presence of fluids may be contributory factors there is an indication of a geological and rheological divide between the rockall hatton region and the rockall basin possibly associated with the caledonian orogenic front

evidence of crustal thinning beneath the limpopo belt and lebombo monocline of southern africa based on regional gravity studies and implications for the reconstruction of gondwana abstract the 600 km long by 250 km wide limpopo belt forms a wedge shaped structure between the zimbabwe and kaapvaal cratons in southern africa the results of a gravity survey which included the part of the limpopo belt within zimbabwe are incorporated with other data and presented as a regional gravity map three gravity profiles crossing the limpopo belt and one within mozambique have been interpreted in terms of lateral changes in crustal structure these interpretations are controlled by density measurements and seismic refraction data across the northern and central parts of the belt the zimbabwe craton appears from gravity modelling to be characterised by a horizontal moho at 34 km depth the limpopo belt is parallel to the ene trending gravity contours and in the east has a southwest northeast line of gravity highs coincident with the nuanetsi sabi volcanic rocks this study has shown that the regional gravity high associated with these features is consistent with crustal thinning probably caused by the breakup of gondwana the crust thins in a south southeast direction to about 30 km in the central limpopo belt with a dip on the moho which varies from about 4 to 7 the short wavelength positive gravity anomalies occurring on the nuanetsi sabi regional gravity high are due to late karoo igneous intrusions and volcanics a north south similar line of gravity highs exists along the lebombo monocline on the mozambique south africa border beyond the lebombo monocline to the east the gravity anomaly suggests a thickness of 6 km or more of sediments that could represent a paleo deltaic environment prograding over the continental margin the lebombo nuanetsi sabi gravity anomaly that dominates the gravity response in the eastern part of the study area is likely to be a failed arm triple junction and could imply a much tighter fit of gondwana than has been previously suggested as such the geometry of such a margin may provide a major constraint on the geometric fit of east antarctica with africa

variations of the effective elastic thickness over china and surroundings and their relation to the lithosphere dynamics abstract the effective elastic thickness te characterizes response of the lithosphere to a long term tectonic loading as a proxy of the lithospheric strength te can be used to address mechanical behavior and deformation of the blocks with complex geological structure here we use the multitaper coherence method to determine spatial variations of te in china and surroundings based on the topography and bouguer gravity anomaly data the results show that the te values are high 70 km over the cratons e g india craton the siberian craton north china block and also variations of these values are significant over these blocks low te corresponds to the young orogens e g himalayas altun shan qilian shan longmenshan qinling dabie and daxing anling taihang mountains etc combined with other data the lateral variations of te within the north china and south china blocks and the tibetan plateau indicate that the lithospheric strength in china mainland depends on both lithospheric structure and mantle dynamics we guess that during the mesozoic cenozoic period the strength of the lithosphere might have been significantly altered by the thermodynamic processes associated with the india eurasia collision in the southwest and the subduction of the pacific plate in the east the te variations also play a major role in the lithospheric evolution and deformation since the mesozoic

ancient selenophysical structure of the grimaldi basin constraints from grail gravity and lola topography abstract the grimaldi impact basin is located near the western limb of the moon and lies to the southwest of the oceanus procellarum a clearly visible positive gravity anomaly exists in its low lying inner wall implying a subsurface mass concentration beneath the crater exploration of this basin could extend our meaningful and fundamental understanding of giant impact processes as well as the structure of mare basins craters limited by the low resolution of previous gravity field models it was once impossible to explore the structure beneath grimaldi the recent high resolution gravity data from the gravity recovery and interior laboratory mission make it possible to break through this barrier prior to our investigation of the selenophysical structure around crater grimaldi we developed a flexure model that includes surface and subsurface loads a localized admittance analysis was performed by combining high resolution gravity data with the high resolution topography data obtained from lunar orbiter laser altimeter within 2 std error constraints we estimated the best fit parameters over grimaldi as well as two other places in its neighborhood all the predicted admittances show a goodness of fit with their corresponding observations the large load ratio 9 2 found at the grimaldi is an indirect mirror of the dominant subsurface load consistent with its large positive gravity anomaly in its low lying floor not only the crustal thickness of 48 km but also the crustal density of 2500 kg m 3 found around grimaldi shows a great accordance with the recent results of grail given the best fit parameters of f bc and c the elastic thickness te is found to be around 28 km over grimaldi taking into account the best fit values in its neighborhood a regional elastic thickness of 30 km could be roughly concluded around grimaldi which is completely in the previous ranges 20

u pb zircon age and nd isotopic composition of granitoids charnockites and supracrustal rocks from heimefrontfjella antarctica heimefrontfjella and mannefallknausane in dronning maud land antarctica comprise an amphibolite facies terrain and a granulite terrain separated by a major mylonite zone the amphibolite terrain is made up of mafic to felsic metavolcanics and metasediments intruded by granitoid plutons the granulite terrain has supracrustal rocks with similar lithologies intruded by felsic plutonic rocks that crystallized as charnockites