ALBERT

Description: The interaction of neighboring subducting lithospheres is a characteristic feature of many tectonically complex areas. Here we use numerical modeling to study the interactions between two oppositely dipping, adjacent subducting lithospheres and to understand their impact on the subduction evolution, mantle flow, and stress propagation through the mantle. As slabs subduct, rollback, and approach, they strongly affect each other if plate edges are at distances 〈~600 km. In this case the mantle flow around slabs combines into a single, large convective cell, trench migration is delayed, and stress increases progressively with decreasing slabs distance. The stress increases at depth as the slabs approach each other, and it shallows up to the near surface as the slabs diverge. A similar setting, with two neighboring slabs migrating and passing each other, is found in areas such as the Alps-Apennines (Europe) and the Ryukyu-Manila subduction zones around Taiwan, where the arcuate trenches suggest the controls of deep slab interactions.

Description: At oceanic margins, syn-convergent exhumation, subduction erosion, and inter-plate coupling are intimately related, but ample questions remain concerning their interaction and individual mechanisms. To analyze these interactions for a thick-skinned, visco-elastic wedge, we focus on properly modeling stresses, energies, and topographies at the inter-plate and wedge bounding interfaces using a Coulomb frictional contact algorithm. In this innovative plane-strain, free surface, Lagrangian finite element model, fault dynamics is modulated by retreating subduction. Subduction is dynamically driven by slab-pull due to a slab sinking in a semi-analytic, computationally favorable approximation of three-dimensional induced mantle flow. Nodal trajectories show that continuous underthrusting of a slab induces a steady state corner flow through forced underplating and subsequent trenchward extrusion due to gravitational spreading. This flow pattern confirms early-proposed models of syn-orogenic deep-seated rock exhumation propelled by coexisting extension and continuous shortening at depth. A distinct reduction in upward flowing material and accompanying decrease of exhumation velocities, to millimeters per year as observed in nature, is induced by a diversion of orogenic wedge material toward the mantle once a subduction channel is formed. The key parameter affecting model evolution and spontaneous formation of a subduction channel is basal friction, which modulates the amount of erosion. However, formation of a subduction channel entrance needs to be ensured through the deformability of the overriding plate, which is influenced by applied pressure at the overriding plate tip and material properties. The down dragging of the overriding plate is sufficient above a threshold inter-plate shear stress of about 2–7 MPa.

Description: Abstract The roughness of the subduction interface is thought to influence seismogenic behavior in subduction zones, but a detailed understanding of how such roughness affects the state of stress along the subduction megathrust is still debated. Here, we use seismotectonic analogue models to investigate the effect of subduction interface roughness on seismicity in subduction zones. We compared analogue earthquake source parameters and slip distributions for two roughness endmembers. Models characterized by a very rough interface have lower integrated fault strength and lower interseismic coupling than models with a smooth interface. Overall, ruptures in the rough models have smaller rupture area, duration and mean displacement. Individual slip distributions indicate a segmentation of the subduction interface by the rough geometry. We propose that flexure of the overriding plate is one of the mechanisms that contribute to a heterogeneous stress distribution, responsible for the observed seismic behavior.

Description: Using silicone slabs as a model analogue for lithospheric plates subducting into a box of glucose syrup, as an analogue of the mantle, we explore the subduction of continental lithosphere in a context of intercontinental collision. The continental indenter pushed by a piston, reproducing the collision, attached to a dense oceanic plate, subducts to two-thirds of the depth of the mantle box. We show that, surprisingly, the continental plate attached to the back wall of the box subducts, even if not attached to a dense oceanic slab. The engine of this subduction is not the weight of the slab, because the slab is lighter than the mantle, but the motion of the piston, which generates horizontal tectonic forces. These are transmitted to the back wall plate through the indenter and the upper plate at the surface, and by the advancing indenter slab through the mantle at shallow depth. We define this process as collisional subduction occurring in a compressional context. The collisional subduction absorbs between 14% and 20% of the convergence, and represents an unexplored component of collisional mass balance. The transmission of tectonic forces far from the collision front favors the formation of a wide plateau. Our experiments reproduce adequately the amount and geometry of the Asian lithosphere subduction episodes inferred during the collision, leading us to conclude that it reproduces adequately the physics of such process.

Description: The formation and evolution of a backarc basin are linked to the dynamics of the subduction system. The opening of the central Mediterranean basins is a well-documented example of backarc extension characterized by short-lived episodes of spreading. The underlying reasons for this episodicity are obscured by the complexity of this subduction system, in which multiple continental blocks enter the subduction zone. We present results from three-dimensional numerical models of laterally varying subduction to explain the mechanism of backarc basin opening and the episodic style of spreading. Our results show that efficient backarc extension can be obtained with an along-trench variation in slab buoyancy that produces localized deformation within the overriding plate. We observe peaks in the trench retreating velocity corresponding first to the opening of the backarc basin, and later to the formation of slab windows. We suggest that the observed episodic trench retreat behavior in the central Mediterranean is caused by the formation of slab windows.

Description: We design three-dimensional dynamically self-consistent laboratory models of subduction to analyze the relationships between overriding plate deformation and subduction dynamics in the upper mantle. We investigate the effects of the subduction of a lithosphere of laterally variable buoyancy on the temporal evolution of trench kinematics and shape, horizontal flow at the top of the asthenosphere, dynamic topography and deformation of the overriding plate. The interface between the two units, analogue to a trench-perpendicular tear fault between a negatively buoyant oceanic plate and positively buoyant continental one, is either fully-coupled or shear-stress free. Differential rates of trench retreat, in excess of 6 cm yr−1 between the two units, trigger a more vigorous mantle flow above the oceanic slab unit than above the continental slab unit. The resulting asymmetrical sublithospheric flow shears the overriding plate in front of the tear fault, and deformation gradually switches from extension to transtension through time. The consistency between our models results and geological observations suggests that the Late Cenozoic deformation of the Aegean domain, including the formation of the North Aegean Trough and Central Hellenic Shear zone, results from the spatial variations in the buoyancy of the subducting lithosphere. In particular, the lateral changes of the subduction regime caused by the Early Pliocene subduction of the old oceanic Ionian plate redesigned mantle flow and excited an increasingly vigorous dextral shear underneath the overriding plate. The models suggest that it is the inception of the Kefalonia Fault that caused the transition between an extension dominated tectonic regime to transtension, in the North Aegean, Mainland Greece and Peloponnese. The subduction of the tear fault may also have helped the propagation of the North Anatolian Fault into the Aegean domain.

Description: Continental collision is an intrinsic feature of plate tectonics. The closure of an oceanic basin leads to the onset of subduction of buoyant continental material, which slows down and eventually stops the subduction process. In natural cases, evidence of advancing margins has been recognized in continental collision zones such as India-Eurasia and Arabia-Eurasia. We perform a parametric study of the geometrical and rheological influence on subduction dynamics during the subduction of continental lithosphere. In our 2-D numerical models of a free subduction system with temperature and stress-dependent rheology, the trench and the overriding plate move self-consistently as a function of the dynamics of the system (i.e. no external forces are imposed). This setup enables to study how continental subduction influences the trench migration. We found that in all models the slab starts to advance once the continent enters the subduction zone and continues to migrate until few million years after the ultimate slab detachment. Our results support the idea that the advancing mode is favoured and, in part, provided by the intrinsic force balance of continental collision. We suggest that the advance is first induced by the locking of the subduction zone and the subsequent steepening of the slab, and next by the sinking of the deepest oceanic part of the slab, during stretching and break-off of the slab. These processes are responsible for the migration of the subduction zone by triggering small-scale convection cells in the mantle that, in turn, drag the plates. The amount of advance ranges from 40 to 220 km and depends on the dip angle of the slab before the onset of collision.