extrusion tectonics of the okhotsk plate northeast asia based on focal mechanism geologic and lineament data faulting in the chersky range northeast asia changes from right lateral transpression between north america and eurasia to left lateral strike slip between north america and the okhotsk plate the location of the okhotsk eurasia boundary is poorly constrained available data suggest this boundary is right lateral the okhotsk plate is being compressed and extruded from between north america and eurasia resulting in high levels of microseismic activity along the southern flanks of the chersky range

shear wave splitting in the appalachians and the urals a case for multilayered anisotropy observations of shear wave splitting in the northeastern u s appalachians and in the foredeep of the urals vary significantly with the back azimuth and incidence angle of the incoming phase these variations suggest two or more layers within the upper mantle with different anisotropic properties synthetic seismograms for simple multilayered anisotropic structures show that shear wave splitting parameters tend to vary substantially with the direction of approach relying on a subset of back azimuth and incidence angle may strongly bias the model inferred especially if the observations are averaged on the other hand the azimuthal splitting pattern provides additional constraints on vertical or lateral variation of anisotropic properties in the earth using a new error estimation technique for splitting we find that individual measurements from broadband data have errors of the order of 3 7 for the fast direction and 0 1 0 2 s for the delay of split shear waves the azimuthal variation of splitting parameters is broadly consistent throughout the appalachian terranes in the northeast united states especially for two long running stations in the northeast united states hrv harvard massachusetts and pal palisades new york observations can be separated into two distinct populations with mean fast axis azimuths of n60 e 4 and n119 e 2 delay values within each population range from near zero to 1 s azimuthal splitting variation for aru arti russia in the foredeep of uralian mountains is characterized by sharp transitions between different groups of observations using synthetic seismograms in simple structures we develop one dimensional anisotropic models under stations hrv and aru the model for hrv includes two layers of anisotropic material under an isotropic crust with fast axis azimuths n53 e and n115 e for the bottom and the top layers respectively the model for the upper mantle under aru includes a layer with a fast axis at n50 e atop a layer with fast axis azimuth n90 e our modeling confirms the need for a layer of strong anisotropy with a slow axis of symmetry in the lower crust under aru reported by levin and park 1997a our results suggest that both urals and appalachians possess a relict anisotropy in the tectosphere associated with past continental collision and accretion underlain by anisotropy with orientation similar to the local absolute plate motion suggesting an asthenospheric component to the signal

trench parallel flow beneath the nazca plate from seismic anisotropy shear wave splitting of s and sks phases reveals the anisotropy and strain field of the mantle beneath the subducting nazca plate cocos plate and the caribbean region these observations can be used to test models of mantle flow two dimensional entrained mantle flow beneath the subducting nazca slab is not consistent with the data rather there is evidence for horizontal trench parallel flow in the mantle beneath the nazca plate along much of the andean subduction zone trench parallel flow is attributale utable to retrograde motion of the slab the decoupling of the slab and underlying mantle and a partial barrier to flow at depth resulting in lateral mantle flow beneath the slab such flow facilitates the transfer of material from the shrinking mantle reservoir beneath the pacific basin to the growing mantle reservoir beneath the atlantic basin trenchparallel flow may explain the eastward motions of the caribbean and scotia sea plates the anomalously shallow bathymetry of the eastern nazca plate the long wavelength geoid high over western south america and it may contribute to the high elevation and intense deformation of the central andes

mantle flow at a slab edge seismic anisotropy in the kamchatka region the junction of the aleutian island and the kamchatka peninsula defines a sharp turn in the boundary of the pacific and north american plates terminating the subduction zones of the northwest pacific the regional pattern of shear wave birefringence near the junction indicates that trench parallel strain follows the seismogenic benioff zone but rotates to trench normal beyond the slab edge asthenospheric mantle is inferred to flow around and beneath the disrupted slab edge and may influence the shallowing dip of the benioff zone at the aleutian junction

geodetic constraints on the rigidity and relative motion of eurasia and north america gps observations in northeastern asia when combined with observations from the global network for the period 1992 1999 yield an angular rotation vector between eurasia and north america consistent with and a factor of two more precise than estimates derived using gps or vlbi data previously available from only western eurasia the new vector implies a pole of relative rotation 1200 km more to the northwest than predicted by the nuvel 1a global plate model suggesting a significant change in the relative motion of eurasia and north america over the past 3 myr the standard deviations of horizontal velocities from rigid plate motion for nineteen stations in eurasia and ten in north america are less than 1 mm yr the observations place an upper bound of 2 mm yr at 95 confidence for relative motion between western and eastern eurasia

anisotropy in kuril kamchatka subduction zone structure to constrain the orientation and extent of seismic velocity anisotropy in the kuril kamchatka subduction zone we have developed a technique that isolates anisotropy at shallow depths by differencing splitting observed in teleseismic shear wave phases olivine a axis orientations inferred from 29 ss s phase pairs and two local s phases vary between the major tectonic components of the trench back arc system although the ss paths do not uniquely constrain a single model of anisotropy a axes are consistent with finite strain patterns predicted by plate convergence and back arc spreading and shearing

evidence for shear wave anisotropy in the mantle wedge beneath south central alaska we investigate shear wave polarization and splitting for more than 200 earthquakes with hypocentral depths ranging from 20 to 180 km beneath southcentral alaska data were recorded at three sites stations skn aui and red a preferred polarization parallel to the strike of the wadati benioff zone wbz n25 e is found for a majority of events however some regions show systematic differences in polarization for a subset of nine events we compute focal mechanisms and find no correlation between the theoretical shear wave polarization caused by the fault plane orientation and the observed polarization delays of the slow versus the fast s wave range from less than 0 05 to 0 25 sec for station skn and up to 0 4 sec for stations aui and red a statistically significant correlation of delay with depth is found r 0 78 with the largest delays corresponding to the deepest events this indicates that the source of the anisotropy cannot be located in the crust based on the ray path geometry the source cannot be solely located in the subducting slab either and must therefore originate in the mantle wedge our results for the subduction zone beneath alaska are consistent with similar studies in other subduction zones that describe slab parallel anisotropy in the mantle wedge

seismicity and structure of the kamchatka subduction zone the configuration of the pacific plate subducted beneath the kamchatka peninsula and the stress distribution in the kamchatka subduction zone ksz were studied using the catalog of the kamchatka regional seismic network focal mechanism solutions estimated from p wave first motions the formal inversion of long period waveforms and centroid moment tensor solutions to the south of 55 n the slab shows an approximately constant dip angle of 55 to the north of 55 n the dip of the slab becomes shallower reaching 35 the maximum depth of seismicity dm varies from 500 km depth near 50 n to 300 km depth at 55 n the volcanic front is almost linear along the main part of the ksz whereas it is sharply shifted landward to the north of 55 n the variation of dm is apparently consistent with the standard empirical relation dm where is the thermal parameter of the subducted slab to the north of 55 n the slab is offset toward the northwest and it is sharply deformed in a narrow contorted zone which is 30 km wide 56 n 161 e to the north of this contortion dm decreases to 100 km the landward shift of the northern part of the slab is reflected by a sharp deviation of the volcanic front to the northwest which follows the 90 160 km isodepth range of the subducted slab the observed value of dm in the northern segment significantly diverges from the global relation dm we interpret this as an effective decrease of the thermal thickness of the subducted lithosphere

anisotropy and flow in pacific subduction zone back arcs we have obtained constraints on the strength and orientation of anisotropy in the mantle beneath the tonga southern kuril japan and izu bonin subduction zones using shear wave splitting in s phases from local earthquakes and in teleseismic core phases such as sks the observed splitting in all four subduction zones is consistent with a model in which the lower transition zone 520 660 km and lower mantle are isotropic and in which significant anisotropy occurs in the back arc upper mantle the upper transition zone 410 520 km beneath the southern kurils appears to contain weak anisotropy the observed fast directions indicate that the geometry of back arc strain in the upper mantle varies systematically across the western pacific rim beneath izu bonin and tonga fast directions are aligned with the azimuth of subducting pacific plate motion and are parallel or sub parallel to overriding plate extension however fast directions beneath the japan sea western honshu and sakhalin island are highly oblique to subducting plate motion and parallel to present or past overriding plate shearing models of back arc mantle flow that are driven by viscous coupling to local plate motions can reproduce the splitting observed in tonga and izu bonin but further three dimensional flow modeling is required to ascertain whether viscous plate coupling can explain the splitting observed in the southern kurils and japan the fast directions in the southern kurils and japan may require strain in the back arc mantle that is driven by regional or global patterns of mantle flow

hunting for azimuthal anisotropy beneath the pacific ocean region lateral variations in azimuthal anisotropy cause significant waveform anomalies in long period surface waves 8 mhz suggesting lateral variations with wavelength twice the spacing of fracture zones in the north central pacific

physiogeographic features of the oubangui catchment and environmental trends reflected in discharge and floods at bangui 1911 1999 central african republic abstract varying discharges of large rivers observed over long periods can reflect environmental trends like climate change within the catchment e g ongoing aridification results in a reduced discharge the present study on the oubangui river in central africa first lines out some physiogeographic features of the almost 500 000 km2 large catchment situated on the vast north equator rise subsequently a discharge record from 1911 1999 of qmax and qmin covering data for 73 years from the gauge station bangui is examined annual variability of oubangui floods is generally high and shows over the past years especially since the mid to end 1960s a less significant trend to a slight depletion of maximum discharge frequency analysis gauss gumbel weibull of floods resulted in return periods between 7 and 35 years distributions calculated after gumbel generally gave the best results no linear and simple evidence exist of the tendency of the river to reduce discharge because of a depletion of rain fall as the oubangui s floods are again increasing since the mid 1990s finally the consequences of oubangui flood hazards for the growing town of bangui are discussed flooding of urban areas from exceptional high qmax discharge is spatially reconstructed for the floods in 1916 1962 and 1999

the tectonics of the okhotsk sea abstract the northern and central parts of the okhotsk sea form an epimesozoic platform the hetero aged acoustic basement is represented by deformed geosynclinal rocks from cretaceous to precambrian in age the slightly deformed sedimentary cover levelled the uneven surface of the acoustic basement and this upper paleogene neogene cover filled up the system of the structural basins the general nw se and w e extensions of the taphrogenic horsts and grabens of the acoustic basement were formed due to extension and subsidence of the earth s crust during the late paleogene neogene

geological evidence for the geographical pattern of mantle return flow and the driving mechanism of plate tectonics tectonic features at the earth s surface can be used to test models for mantle return flow and to determine the geographic pattern of this flow a model with shallow return flow and deep continental roots places the strongest constraints on the geographical pattern of return flow and predicts recognizable surface manifestations because of the progressive shrinkage of the pacific averaging 0 5 km2 yr over the last 180 m y this model predicts upper mantle outflow through the three gaps in the chain of continents rimming the pacific caribbean drake passage australian antarctic gap in this model upper mantle return flow streams originating at the western pacific trenches and at the java trench meet south of australia filling in behind this rapidly northward moving continent and providing an explanation for the negative bathymetric and gravity anomalies of the australian antarctic discordance the long continued tectonic movements toward the east that characterize the caribbean and the easternmost scotia sea may be produced by viscous coupling to the predicted pacific outflow through the gaps and the caribbean floor slopes in the predicted direction if mantle outflow does pass through the gaps in the pacific perimeter it must pass beneath three seismic zones central america lesser antilles scotia sea none of these seismic zones shows foci below 200 km mantle material flowing through the caribbean and drake passage gaps would supply the mid atlantic ridge while the java trench supplies the indian ocean ridges so that deep mantle upwellings need not be centered under spreading ridges and therefore are not required to move laterally to follow ridge migrations the analysis up to this point suggests that upper mantle return flow is a response to the motion of the continents the second part of the paper suggests a possible driving mechanism for the plate tectonic process which may explain why the continents move this hypothetical driving mechanism has four aspects 1 the lower mantle convects 2 this convection drives the continents by drag on their deep roots 3 return flow in the upper mantle provides a volumetric balance for the motion of the continental masses without passing under them and 4 oceanic plates are effectively decoupled from the asthenosphere and are driven largely by slab pull this mechanism accounts for the opening of the atlantic the ability of spreading ridges to stay on the midlines of oceans and the penetration of india into asia following their collision continental motions strongly imply lower mantle upwelling and divergence beneath the atlantic and southeast indian oceans and convergence and subsidence along the tethyan belt this picture disagrees with the concept derived from hot spot studies of an undeforming absolute reference framework at depth but weaknesses in current hot spot theory would make a rejection of the present model on this ground premature if the present model is generally correct a fairly simple pattern of lower mantle convection with as few as four cells may explain much of the tectonic complexity of the earth

on the relation between seismic anisotropy and finite strain because seismic anisotropy in the upper mantle is due primarily to lattice preferred orientation lpo of olivine crystals induced by deformation observations of anisotropy can provide constraints on mantle deformation and flow in this paper we use a previously published theory for deformation induced lpo ribe and yu 1991 to quantify the relation between seismic anisotropy and deformation for two model compositions a pure olivine dunite aggregate and a harzburgite comprising 70 olivine and 30 enstatite analytical and numerical solutions of the governing equations show that the predicted lpo and hence also the seismic anisotropy depends only on the finite strain and not on the deformation path by which that strain is produced the magnitude of the anisotropy depends only on the ratios c1 c2 and c2 c3 where c1 c2 c3 are the lengths of the principle axes of the finite strain ellipsoid and the directions of maximum and minimum compressional wave velocity vp coincide with the axes c1 and c3 respectively we calculate the percent anisotropies for compresional and shear waves propagating along the three principle axes of the finite strain ellipsoid as functions of the axial ratios c1 c2 and c2 c3 for our two model compositions however inferences of the magnitude of finite strain obtained using these results are likely to be minimum estimates because our theory neglects the effects of dynamic recrystallization finally we present as a byproduct of this study a new direct method for calculating the finite strain produced by an arbitiary deformation history

rates and time scales of clay mineral formation by weathering in saprolitic regoliths of the southern appalachians from geochemical mass balance rates of clay formation in three watersheds located at the coweeta hydrologic laboratory western north carolina have been determined from solute flux based mass balance methods a system of mass balance equations with enough equations and unknowns to allow calculation of secondary mineral formation rates as well as the more commonly determined primary mineral dissolution rates was achieved by including rare earth elements ree in the mass balance rates of clay mineral formation determined by mass balance methods have been used to calculate the time needed for a 5 50 g kg 1 change in relative clay abundance in the saprolite at coweeta this corresponds to the response time of the clay mineral to for example a change in climate the 5 change in relative clay abundance is the smallest change that can generally be detected using x ray diffraction xrd response times range from tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of years extrapolating the coweeta clay formation rates to other southern appalachian regoliths the time required to form measured clay abundances production times in eastern blue ridge and inner piedmont regolith have been calculated the production times of clay mineral assemblages range from 2 k y to 2 m y with mean values ranging from 50 k y to 1 m y the results of this study are consistent with the arguments of thiry 2000 1 that the best resolution of the paleoclimatic record in marine clay rich sediments and mudrocks is 1 or 2 m y 1 ref 107

signature of remnant slabs in the north pacific from p wave tomography summary a 3 d ray tracing technique was used in a global tomographic inversion in order to obtaintomographicimagesofthenorthpacific thedatareportedbythegeophysical surveyofrussia 1955 1997 wereusedtogetherwiththecataloguesoftheinternational seismologicalcenter 1964 1991 andtheusgeologicalsurveynationalearthquake information center 1991 1998 and the recompiled catalogue was reprocessed the final data set used for following the inversion contained 523430 summary ray paths the whole of the earth s mantle was parametrized by cells of 2 2 and 19 layers the large and sparse system of observation equations was solved using an iterative lsqr algorithm asubhorizontalhigh velocityanomalyisrevealedjustabovethe660kmdiscontinuity beneaththealeutiansubductionzone thishigh velocityfeatureisobservedatlatitudes of up to 70 n and is interpreted as a remnant of the subducted kula plate which disappeared through ridge subduction at about 48ma a further positive velocity perturbation feature can be identified beneath the chukotka peninsula and okhotsk sea extending from 300 to 660km depth and then either extending further down to 800km chukotka or deflecting along the 660km discontinuity okhotsk sea this high velocity anomaly is interpreted as a remnant slab of the okhotsk plate accreted to siberia at 55ma

empirical relationships among the convergence rate of plates rollback rate of trench axis and island arc tectonics laws of convergence rate of plates abstract the data on 27 recent arcs which were subducted by normal oceanic lithosphere were compiled among the compression extension rates for island arcs v a compression is defined as positive and the kinematic components of absolute plate motions parallel to the direction of backarc compression extension v on oceanward velocity of the overriding plate v sn continentward velocity of the subducting plate and v tn rollback rate of the trench axis the equations v a v on v sn 7 2 cm y 1 v tn 7 2 cm y v sn 2 are found to hold as for the convergent zones associated with a wadati benioff zone deeper than 200 km equation 1 suggests that backarc spreading and crustal shortening play the role of compensating the deviation of the convergence rate from the critical value of 7 2 cm y the equation 2 means that any subducting oceanic lithosphere has the potentiality of making the trench axis rollback at the rate of 7 2 cm y and that the virtual rollback rate v tn is determined by the balance between the potential rollback rate 7 2 cm y and v sn the present author calls the kinematic relationships represented by equations 1 and 2 laws of convergence rate of plates the convergent zones of plates associated with the wadati benioff zone shallower than 200 km also show a tendency that the greater and smaller values of v on v sn correspond to the backarc compression and extension however the critical value is 3 4 cm y instead of 7 2 cm y

quasi love phases between tonga and hawaii observations simulations and explanations seismograms of some shallow tonga earthquakes observed at hawaii contain sv polarized phases in the love wave time window most prominently on the vertical component given the geometry of the observations 40 45 such phases may be explained either as body waves or as mode converted surface waves detailed synthetic seismogram modeling of representative events reveals several instances where the body wave explanation is inadequate even when plausible uncertainties in the source mechanism are taken into account the observed sv polarized phase can instead be generated through love rayleigh scattering which requires laterally varying seismic anisotropy along the tonga hawaii path trial and error forward modeling with simple structures based on the transversely isotropic mid pacific velocity model pa5 of gaherty et al 1996 obtains velocity structure that yields synthetic seismograms matching the observations this model while non unique suggests first order constraints on the lateral variation in anisotropic properties and associated mantle flow along the tonga hawaii path by examining trade offs in model parameters we conclude that robust features of the model are 1 a transition from radial to mixed radial and azimuthal anisotropy 3 5 from hawaii 2 the nw se alignment of the axis of azimuthal anisotropy 3 higher degree of p anisotropy relative to s anisotropy and 4 the presence of azimuthal anisotropy within upper 200 250 km of the mantle taken together these features imply a disruption of mantle fabric by the processes forming hawaii emperor volcanic system a model with anisotropic gradients in both the lithospheric lid and shallow asthenosphere is the simplest extension of our starting model however an equivalent data fit can be obtained if the azimuthal anisotropy gradients are restricted to line beneath the high velocity lid of model pa5 so that mantle hot spot flow need not penetrate the lithospheric lid

a laboratory model of subduction zone anisotropy abstract measurements of split seismic shear waves near pacific subduction zones show that fast polarization directions are primarily trench parallel in the seaward side mantle beneath a subducting slab and variable in the mantle wedge beneath back arc basins it is generally accepted that the azimuth of the fast polarization direction defines the average orientation of the crystallographic a axis in olivine here we use laboratory experiments to determine the orientation of the olivine a axis in the upper mantle in the vicinity of a subducting slab a laboratory analog for olivine a axis motion during creep deformation is developed using small cylinders whiskers suspended in a viscous fluid subduction beneath a stationary overriding plate variable dip angles and realistic rollback and down dip plate kinematics are examined plate rollback produces strong plate parallel whisker alignments for all dip angles examined alignment in the wedge occurs in three layers a layer of dip parallel alignment above the downgoing plate a layer of subhorizontal alignment beneath the overriding plate and a core of intermediate orientations the amount of alignment beneath the overriding plate and the wedge core decreases with increasing dip angle our results indicate that olivine a axis orientation in the seaward side mantle is controlled by the amount of slab rollback and that orientations in the mantle wedge depend upon slab dip angle

a test of present day plate geometries for northeast asia and japan alternative geometries for the present day configuration of plate boundaries in northeast asia and japan are tested using nuvel 1 and 256 horizontal earthquake slip vectors from the japan and northern kuril trenches statistical analysis of the slip vectors is used to determine whether the north american eurasian or okhotsk plate overlies the trench along the northern kuril trench sup vectors are well fit by the nuvel 1 pacific north america euler pole but are poorly fit by the pacific eurasia euler pole results for the japan trench are less conclusive but suggest that much of honshu and hokkaido are also part of the north american plate the simplest geometry consistent with the trench slip vectors is a geometry in which the north american plate extends south to 41 n and possibly includes northern honshu and southern hokkaido although these results imply that the diffuse seismicity that connects the lena river delta to sakhalin island and the eastern sea of japan records motion between eurasia and north america onshore geologic and seismic data define an additional belt of seismicity in siberia that cannot be explained with this geometry assuming that these two seismic belts constitute evidence for an okhotsk block two published kinematic models for motion of the okhotsk block are tested the first model which predicts motion of up to 15 mm yr 1 relative to north america is rejected because kuril and japan trench slip vectors are fit more poorly than for the simpler geometry described above the second model gives a good fit to the trench slip vectors but only if okhotsk north america motion is slower than 5 mm yr 1

horizontal shear flow in the mantle beneath the tonga arc in the tonga subduction zone a systematic shear deformation in which deep material moves relatively to the south is superimposed on the mode of down dip shortening which is characteristic of the region we interpret this observation together with a tectonic reconstruction in terms of the interaction between the subducting lithospheric slab and a horizontal shear flow in the mantle