ALBERT

Description: The Alps are the archetypical collisional orogenic system on Earth and yet our understanding of processes controlling topographic growth in the Cenozoic remains incomplete. Whereas ideas and models on the Alps are abundant, data from the foreland basin record able to constrain the timing of erosion and sedimentation, mechanisms of basin accommodation and basin deformation are sparse. We combine seismic stratigraphy, micropaleontology, white mica 40 Ar/ 39 Ar, detrital zircon (U-Th)/He and apatite fission track thermochronology to Miocene-Pliocene samples from the retro-wedge foreland basin (Saluzzo Basin in Italy) and to Oligocene-Miocene sedimentary rocks from the pro-wedge foreland basin (Bârreme Basin in France) of the Western Alps. Our new data show that exhumation in the Oligocene-Miocene was non uniform across the Western Alps. Topographic growth was underway since the Oligocene and exhumation was concentrated on the pro-side of the orogenic system. Rapid and episodic early Miocene exhumation of the Western Alps was concentrated instead on the retro-side of the orogen and correlates with a major unconformity in the proximal retro-foreland basin. A phase of orogenic construction is recorded by exhumation of the proximal pro-foreland in both the Central and Western Alps at ca. 16 Ma. This is associated with high sedimentation rates, and by inference erosion rates, and suggests that an increase in accretionary flux associated with the dynamics of subduction of Europe under Adria controlled orogenic expansion in the Miocene.

Description: The Himalayan-Tibetan Plateau is Earth's highest topographic feature, and formed largely during Cenozoic time as India collided with and subducted beneath southern Asia. The 〉1300 km long, late Oligocene-early Miocene Kailas basin formed within the collisional suture zone more than 35 Ma after the onset of collision, and provides a detailed picture of surface environments, processes and possible geodynamic mechanisms operating within the suture zone during the ongoing convergence of India and Asia. We present new geochronological, sedimentological, organic geochemical and palaeontological data from a previously undocumented 400 km long portion of the Kailas basin. The new data demonstrate that this part of the basin was partly occupied by large, deep, probably meromictic lakes surrounded by coal-forming swamps. Lacustrine facies include coarse- and fine-grained turbidites, profundal black shales and marginal Gilbert-type deltas. Organic geochemical temperature proxies suggest that palaeolake water was warmer than 25 °C, and cyprinid fish fossils indicate an ecology capable of supporting large fish. Our findings demonstrate a brief period of low elevation in the suture zone during Oligocene-Miocene time (26–21 Ma) and call for a geodynamic mechanism capable of producing a long (〉1000 km) and narrow basin along the southern edge of the upper, Asian plate, long after the onset of intercontinental collision. Kailas basin deposits presently are exposed at elevations 〉6000 m, requiring dramatic elevation gain in the region after Kailas deposition, without strongly shortening the upper crust. Episodic Indian slab rollback, followed by break-off and subsequent renewal of flat-slab subduction, can account for features of the Kailas basin. © 2016 The Authors. Basin Research © 2016 John Wiley & Sons Ltd, European Association of Geoscientists & Engineers and International Association of Sedimentologists.

Description: Located on the southern margin of the Lhasa terrane in southern Tibet, the Xigaze forearc basin records Cretaceous to lower Eocene sedimentation along the southern margin of Asia, prior to and during the initial stages of continental collision with the Tethyan Himalaya in the Early Eocene. We present new measured stratigraphic sections, totalling 4.5km stratigraphic thickness, from a 60km E-W segment of the western portion of the Xigaze forearc basin, northeast of the Lopu Kangri Range (29.8007°N, 84.91827°E). In addition, we apply U-Pb detrital zircon geochronology to constrain the provenance and maximum depositional ages of investigated strata. Stratigraphic ages range between ca. 88 and ca. 54Ma and sedimentary facies indicate a shoaling-upward trend from deep-marine turbidites to fluvial deposits. Depositional environments of coeval Cretaceous strata along strike include deep-marine distal turbidites, slope-apron debris-flow deposits and marginal marine carbonates. This along-strike variability in facies suggests an irregular paleogeography of the Asian margin prior to collision. Paleocene-Eocene strata are composed of shallow marine carbonates with abundant foraminifera such as Nummulites-Discocyclina and Miscellanea-Daviesina and transition into fluvial deposits dated at ca. 54Ma. Sandstone modal analyses, conglomerate clast compositions and detrital zircon U-Pb geochronology indicate that forearc detritus in this region was derived solely from the Gangdese magmatic arc to the north. In addition, U-Pb detrital zircon age spectra within the upper Xigaze forearc stratigraphy are similar to those from Eocene foreland basin strata south of the Indus-Yarlung suture near Sangdanlin, suggesting that the Xigaze forearc was a possible source of Sangdanlin detritus by ca. 55Ma. We propose a model in which the Xigaze forearc prograded south over the accretionary prism and onto the advancing Tethyan Himalayan passive margin between 58 and 54Ma, during late stage evolution of the forearc basin and the beginning of collision with the Tethyan Himalaya. The lack of documented forearc strata younger than ca. 51Ma suggests that sedimentation in the forearc basin ceased at this time owing to uplift resulting from continued continental collision. © 2014 The Authors.

Description: The arid Puna plateau of the southern Central Andes is characterized by Cenozoic distributed shortening forming intramontane basins that are disconnected from the humid foreland because of the defeat of orogen-traversing channels. Thick Tertiary and Quaternary sedimentary fills in Puna basins have reduced topographic contrasts between the compressional basins and ranges, leading to a typical low-relief plateau morphology. Structurally identical basins that are still externally drained straddle the eastern border of the Puna and document the eastward propagation of orographic barriers and ensuing aridification. One of them, the Angastaco basin, is transitional between the highly compartmentalized Puna highlands and the undeformed Andean foreland. Sandstone petrography, structural and stratigraphic analysis, combined with detrital apatite fission-track thermochronology from a ∼6200-m-thick Miocene to Pliocene stratigraphic section in the Angastaco basin, document the late Eocene to late Pliocene exhumation history of source regions along the eastern border of the Puna (Eastern Cordillera (EC)) as well as the construction of orographic barriers along the southeastern flank of the Central Andes. Onset of exhumation of a source in the EC in late Eocene time as well as a rapid exhumation of the Sierra de Luracatao (in the EC) at about 20Ma are recorded in the detrital sediments of the Angastaco basin. Sediment accumulation in the basin began ∼15Ma, a time at which the EC had already built sufficient topography to prevent Puna sourced detritus from reaching the basin. After ∼13Ma, shortening shifted eastward, exhuming ranges that preserve an apatite fission-track partial annealing zone recording cooling during the late Cretaceous rifting event. Facies changes and fossil content suggest that after 9Ma, the EC constituted an effective orographic barrier that prevented moisture penetration into the plateau. Between 3.4 and 2.4Ma, another orographic barrier was uplifted to the east, leading to further aridification and pronounced precipitation gradients along the mountain front. This study emphasizes the important role of tectonics in the evolution of climate in this part of the Andes. © 2006 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

Description: Important aspects of the Andean foreland basin in Argentina remain poorly constrained, such as the effect of deformation on deposition, in which foreland basin depozones Cenozoic sedimentary units were deposited, how sediment sources and drainages evolved in response to tectonics, and the thickness of sediment accumulation. Zircon U-Pb geochronological data from Eocene-Pliocene sedimentary strata in the Eastern Cordillera of northwestern Argentina (Pucará-Angastaco and La Viña areas) provide an Eocene (ca. 38 Ma) maximum depositional age for the Quebrada de los Colorados Formation. Sedimentological and provenance data reveal a basin history that is best explained within the context of an evolving foreland basin system affected by inherited palaeotopography. The Quebrada de los Colorados Formation represents deposition in the distal to proximal foredeep depozone. Development of an angular unconformity at ca. 14 Ma and the coarse-grained, proximal character of the overlying Angastaco Formation (lower to upper Miocene) suggest deposition in a wedge-top depozone. Axial drainage during deposition of the Palo Pintado Formation (upper Miocene) suggests a fluvial-lacustrine intramontane setting. By ca. 4 Ma, during deposition of the San Felipe Formation, the Angastaco area had become structurally isolated by the uplift of the Sierra de los Colorados Range to the east. Overall, the Eastern Cordillera sedimentary record is consistent with a continuous foreland basin system that migrated through the region from late Eocene through middle Miocene time. By middle Miocene time, the region lay within the topographically complex wedge-top depozone, influenced by thick-skinned deformation and re-activation of Cretaceous rift structures. The association of the Eocene Quebrada del los Colorados Formation with a foredeep depozone implies that more distal foreland deposits should be represented by pre-Eocene strata (Santa Barbara Subgroup) within the region. © 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd, European Association of Geoscientists & Engineers and International Association of Sedimentologists.

Description: Studies in both modern and ancient Cordilleran-type orogenic systems suggest that processes associated with flat-slab subduction control the geological and thermal history of the upper plate; however, these effects prove difficult to deconvolve from processes associated with normal subduction in an active orogenic system. We present new geochronological and thermochronological data from four depositional areas in the western Sierras Pampeanas above the Central Andean flat-slab subduction zone between 27° S and 30° S evaluating the spatial and temporal thermal conditions of the Miocene–Pliocene foreland basin. Our results show that a relatively high late Miocene–early Pliocene geothermal gradient of 25–35 °C km−1 was typical of this region. The absence of along-strike geothermal heterogeneities, as would be expected in the case of migrating flat-slab subduction, suggests that either the response of the upper plate to refrigeration may be delayed by several millions of years or that subduction occurred normally throughout this region through the late Miocene. Exhumation of the foreland basin occurred nearly synchronously along strike from 27 to 30° S between ca. 7 Ma and 4 Ma. We propose that coincident flat-slab subduction facilitated this wide-spread exhumation event. Flexural modelling coupled with geohistory analysis show that dynamic subsidence and/or uplift associated with flat-slab subduction is not required to explain the unique deep and narrow geometry of the foreland basin in the region implying that dynamic processes were a minor component in the creation of accommodation space during Miocene–Pliocene deposition. © 2017 The Authors. Basin Research © 2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd, European Association of Geoscientists & Engineers and International Association of Sedimentologists

Description: Investigation of a 〉6-km-thick succession of Cretaceous to Cenozoic sedimentary rocks in the Tajik Basin reveals that this depocentre consists of three stacked basin systems that are interpreted to reflect different mechanisms of subsidence associated with tectonics in the Pamir Mountains: a Lower to mid-Cretaceous succession, an Upper Cretaceous–Lower Eocene succession and an Eocene–Neogene succession. The Lower to mid-Cretaceous succession consists of fluvial deposits that were primarily derived from the Triassic Karakul–Mazar subduction–accretion complex in the northern Pamir. This succession is characterized by a convex-up (accelerating) subsidence curve, thickens towards the Pamir and is interpreted as a retroarc foreland basin system associated with northward subduction of Tethyan oceanic lithosphere. The Upper Cretaceous to early Eocene succession consists of fine-grained, marginal marine and sabkha deposits. The succession is characterized by a concave-up subsidence curve. Regionally extensive limestone beds in the succession are consistent with late stage thermal relaxation and relative sea-level rise following lithospheric extension, potentially in response to Tethyan slab rollback/foundering. The Upper Cretaceous–early Eocene succession is capped by a middle Eocene to early Oligocene (ca. 50–30 Ma) disconformity, which is interpreted to record the passage of a flexural forebulge. The disconformity is represented by a depositional hiatus, which is 10–30 Myr younger than estimates for the initiation of India–Asia collision and overlaps in age with the start of prograde metamorphism recorded in the Pamir gneiss domes. Overlying the disconformity, a 〉4-km-thick upper Eocene–Neogene succession displays a classic, coarsening upward unroofing sequence characterized by accelerating subsidence, which is interpreted as a retro-foreland basin associated with crustal thickening of the Pamir during India–Asia collision. Thus, the Tajik Basin provides an example of a long-lived composite basin in a retrowedge position that displays a sensitivity to plate margin processes. Subsidence, sediment accumulation and basin-forming mechanisms are influenced by subduction dynamics, including periods of slab-shallowing and retreat. © 2019 The Authors. Basin Research © 2019 John Wiley & Sons Ltd, European Association of Geoscientists & Engineers and International Association of Sedimentologists