## 2 Geological Setting  
Turkey is situated within a tectonically intricate domain formed by the convergence of the Eurasian, African, and Arabian plates. The present-day tectonics of the region reflects a protracted history of subduction, accretion, and continental collision events spanning from the Late Palaeozoic to the Cenozoic [27,28]. The study area is located in central Anatolia, whose major tectonic units include the Kirsehir Block and the Sakarya Zone, bounded by the Pontides to the north and the Tauride Platform to the south. These domains are separated by significant suture zones, such as the Izmir-Ankara-Erzincan and Inner Tauride sutures, representing the remnants of closed Neotethyan oceanic basins associated with the Alpine orogen (Figure 1).  
The Elazg region in Eastern Anatolia occupies a critical location within the Southeast Anatolian Orogenic Belt (SAOB) and reveals a complex lithotectonic configuration shaped by multiple tectonic phases, primarily related to the subduction and subsequent closure of the southern branch of the Neotethys Ocean and subsequent continental collisions [29,30]. The regional stratigraphy is composed, from bottom to top, of the Keban-Malatya Metamorphics, ophiolitic units, Late Cretaceous-Eocene magmatic rocks, the Hazar Group, the Maden Complex, and unconsolidated cover units.  
The Keban-Malatya Metamorphics of Precambrian to Triassic ages constitutes the basement of the region and comprise high-grade metamorphic rocks, including praisses, schists, and marbles. These units are interpreted as fragments of the northern margin of the Arabian Plate and represent the oldest exposed lithologies in the region which are described below [31, 32, 33, 34]. Late Cretaceous ophiolitic units overlie the metamorphic basement, remnants of the Neotethyan oceanic lithosphere. These ophiolites--comprising serpentinised peridotites, layered gabbros, and sheeted dyke complexes--are thought to have been emplaced onto the continental crust during intra-oceanic subduction and subsequent abduction events in the Late Cretaceous [35, 36, 37, 38].  
The region is also marked by the Late Cretaceous Elazg M magmatic Complex, a suite of plutonic rocks that intrude both ophiolitic and surrounding sedimentary-volcanic sequences. These intrusions include gabbros, diorites, tonalites, and grandoiorites, reflecting a multi-stage magmatic evolution [29,39]. The Maden Complex, which overlies these magmatic and ophiolitic units in places, comprises Middle Eocene volcanic and pyroclastic rocks, including basalts, andesites, dacites, and associated sedimentary interlayers. These rocks exhibit calc-alkaline to shoshonitic compositions and are interpreted to have formed during a post-collisional extensional regime triggered by asthenospheric upwelling and lithospheric delamination [40]. Sr-Nd isotopic signatures indicate variable contributions from depleted mantle and enriched continental crustal sources. The Hazar Group of Palaeocene-Eocene age includes predominantly flysch-type sedimentary sequences deposited in a foreland basin setting. In some sections, the Hazar Group exhibits lateral facies transitions into contemporaneous volcanic rocks, suggesting episodic volcanic activity coeval with sedimentation [41]. Finally, the cover units consist of Quaternary alluvial deposits and unconsolidated terrestrial sediments that unconformably overlie the older basement and volcanic-sedimentary successions. These units record post-orogenic erosion and surface processes shaping the modern landscape.