Michael C. Daly

Rift basin evolution in Africa: the influence of reactivated steep basement shear zones

Summary Phanerozoic rift basin evolution in Africa has been strongly influenced by the pre-existing basement structure inherited from Precambrian tectonics. Two modes of basement reactivation may be identified; the largely dip-slip reactivation of gently dipping shear zone and thrust structures and the largely strike-slip reactivation of steep shear zones and faults. In particular, crustal scale steep basement shear zones have exercised a profound control on rift basin formation on a regional scale. Such shear zone structures are seen to govern the location, trend and structural style of rifts and appear to constrain the orientation of displacements generating the rifts. The shear zones are relatively narrow, high strain zones formed during ductile deformation. They occur as steep, crustal scale ramps that define a pronounced mechanical anisotropy within the African continental crust. These structures are difficult to reactivate by dip-slip movement and thus tend to act as major strike-slip transfer zones during later extensional events. This paper discusses examples of the steep shear zone-rift relationship from three of the rift systems of Africa: the Upper Palaeozoic (Karoo) rifts of Central Africa, the Mesozoic rifts of the Sudan and the Cenozoic rifts of East Africa. These discussions indicate that steep shear zones are sites of rift nucleation and play a fundamental role in the mechanisms of rift propagation and subsequent continental breakup.

Cenozoic plate tectonics and basin evolution in Indonesia

Abstract SE Asia comprises a complex array of Cenozoic basins. The chronostratigraphic evolution of these basins may be understood within the plate tectonic evolution of SE Asia. The relative motions of India, Australia, the Pacific and Eurasia provide the boundary conditions for this evolution. Indian collision and indentation destroyed a subducting northern Tethyan margin and led to major clockwise rotation of SE Asia. The South China Sea continental shelf developed after collapse of the West Pacific subducting margin. Crustal extension led to sea floor spreading and the formation of the Reed Bank Terrane and, at its trailing edge, the South China Sea. Sumatran basins opened due to back arc extension in the Eocene. Closure of a marginal ocean basin resulted in a major contractional event in the Late Oligocene. The Gulf of Thailand basins and Andaman Sea opened in response to rotation of Indochina and oblique convergence at the precursor to the Sunda trench. Inversion of the southern end of these basins and uplift in Borneo coincided with the collision of the Reed Bank Terrane with Borneo. Opening of the Makassar Straits, Kutei, Tarakan and Barito basins occurred during the Eocene. Inversion of these basins was a result of the collision of Australia and Australian derived microplates in the Late Miocene/Pliocene. Pliocene fold and thrust belt and foreland basin formation in New Guinea was a result of oblique arc collision. Basin evolution of SE Asia is not a result of major lateral extrusion in front of the Indian indenter. The major effect of this collision is in terms of the clockwise rotation of Indochina and extension along the Sumatran active margin.

Crustal lineaments and shear zones in Africa: Their relationship to plate movements

Abstract Many of the major lineaments in southern Africa are major ductile shear zones with large displacement, occurring within, though often bounding orogenic belts. An example is the boundary to the Limpopo belt in Botswana and Zimbabwe. However, some of these shear zones only record slight displacement when considered on a crustal scale; they are merely planes recording differential movement on much larger, flat to gently dipping, shear zones where the boundary to the orogenic belt is a low-angle thrust zone. These different types of shear zones are clearly shown in the Pan-African belt of Zambia where large ENE-trending lineaments have been recorded. Recent work has shown the northern group of shears to be large lateral ramps; for example, the rocks of the copper belt are part of an ENE-verging thrust package, the southern boundary of which is a major, oblique to lateral ramp. In southern Zambia shears are more analogous to major transform faults; they form as tear faults separating zones of different thrust vergence. A possible plate tectonic model is given for this part of Africa, showing the different relative plate movement vectors estimated from the geometry of the Pan-African shear zones.

Crustal Shear Zones and Thrust Belts: Their Geometry and Continuity in Central Africa [and Discussion]

The Precambrian orogenic belts of Africa are often defined by ductile shear zones which developed in response to large displacements, and which mark orogenic ‘ fronts ’ between mobile and stable parts of the crust. They are thought to represent the major crustal reflectors seen by seismic reflection profiling in younger orogenic belts. These orogenic fronts are connected by shear zones that transfer displacement or accommodate different displacements, between orogenic segments. Smaller shears within an orogenic belt occur as a result of differential movements. These shear zones are seen to pass from flat-lying to steep structures and may have a thrust or strike-slip sense. They compare with the staircase trajectories characteristic of foreland thrust belts. In common with thrust belts, the geometry of the shear zones can be used to estimate displacement direction, as can regional extensional fabrics developed in the associated high-strain tectonites. Central Africa has been previously described as a complex network of late Proterozoic ‘mobile belts’. The recognition of similar displacements and time equivalence in these belts allows their reinterpretation in terms of a linked thrust and strike-slip shear-zone system. An example is the Damaran, Lufilian, Zambezi and Ukingan system. These orogenic belts share a similar displacement picture and broad time equivalence and were apparently linked in a lower crustal shear zone of continental dimensions. This shear zone system appears to have developed under a single tectonic framework

The intracratonic Irumide Belt of Zambia and its bearing on collision orogeny during the Proterozoic of Africa

Summary The Irumide Belt of Zambia is often quoted as being typical of African intracratonic mobile belts which involve no crustal shortening or major displacements. This belt is shown here to include the NW-facing foreland fold and thrust zone of the Southern Moçambique Belt and to have involved considerable crustal shortening. A crustal scale ‘pop-up’ structure separates this foreland from the internal higher-grade granulite-facies rocks of Malawi and Moçambique where major SE-facing nappe structures of Irumide age have been described. Several possible suture zones are identified and the Irumide-Moçambique Belt is interpreted as resulting from collisional processes during the Mid-Proterozoic. The adjacent Ubendian Belt represents a continental transform fault zone associated with crustal shortening across the Irumide Belt. The implications of these interpretations regarding the onset of plate tectonics in the Proterozoic and Archaean are briefly discussed.

The Lufilian arc and Irumide belt of Zambia: Results of a geotraverse across their intersection

Abstract The Kibaran aged Irumide belt and the Pan African aged Lufilian arc intersect in central Zambia. The Irumide belt is a thrust belt comprising northwesterly verging structures in the north, upright structures in the central zone and southeasterly verging structures in the south. Tectonic transport, as deduced from regional stretching lineations, changes across the central upright zone. To the north of this zone, movement is to the northwest; to the south of the zone, movement is to the southeast. This divergence of structures about a central upright zone is recognized throughout the belt. The Lufilian arc comprises a northeasterly verging thrust belt involving large basement thrust sheets forming domal culimations throughoutregion. These thrusts climb up-section towards the northeast and have telescoped the Katangan stratigraphy. In the Copperbelt area of the arc, the Irumide and Lufilian structures are separated by a marked unconformity. However in the Mubalashi area, south of the Copperbelt, there is aa coincidence of strike of Lufilian and Irumide structures which, in the past, has made their separation difficult. The structures can be separated on the basis of stretching lineations associated with the deformation. In the ENE striking Lufilian structures stretching lineations are seen to be sub-horizontal, suggesting a lateral ramp relationship to the main Lufilian deformation. Similar striking Irumide structures have a steeply plunging down dip lineation. The intersection of these two belts represents the junction of two different tectonic systems operating in Africa during the Late Proterozoic.

Brasiliano crustal structure and the tectonic setting of the Parnaíba basin of NE Brazil: Results of a deep seismic reflection profile

A 1430 km, deep crustal, seismic reflection profile of the Parnaiba basin shows an asymmetric, structured western margin and a gently dipping eastern margin. The ~3 km thick, Phanerozoic sedimentary section overlies a pronounced, planar, regional unconformity that crosses three Precambrian blocks with differing seismic facies: the Amazonian/Araguaia block, the Parnaiba block, and the Borborema block. The blocks are separated by steep crustal-scale boundaries across which seismic facies change abruptly. In the west, the ophiolitic metasedimentary rocks of the Araguaia Group overlie the Amazonian craton. Both craton and metasediments terminate eastward against a steep, east dipping fault zone defining the Amazonian/Araguaia block and Parnaiba block boundary. Reactivation of this Neoproterozoic margin in the Late Triassic and Late Jurassic/Early Cretaceous, folded and elevated basement and basin over 2 km. A second crustal boundary defines the eastern margin of the Parnaiba block with the Neoproterozoic Borborema block. This boundary is interpreted as the extension of the Transbrasiliano shear zone. These data demonstrate that the basement of the Parnaiba basin was formed during Brasiliano orogenesis by west directed collision-related thrusting, succeeded by lateral accretion along steep, crustal-scale boundaries. After formation of a post-Brasiliano peneplain, the Parnaiba basin developed seamlessly across three very different crustal blocks and appears to have been significantly larger than its present outline. No extensive underlying rift system is evident suggesting that basement structure had little to do with basin formation, but that episodic reactivation of the boundary zones and basement fabric has controlled the structuring and preservation of the basin.

Geochronology of the Mkushi Gneiss Complex, central Zambia

Abstract Rb-Sr and K-Ar ages are reported from the Mkushi Gneiss Complex and its intrusives in central Zambia. Of the Rb-Sr whole-rock data of the Mkushi gneisses (three suites, 22 samples) only one suite (six samples) defines an isochron of 1777 ± 89 Ma with initial 87Sr/86Sr of 0.713 ± 0.0006 (errors 95% confidence level; λ87Rb = 1.42·10−11 a−1). The other samples scatter below this isochron, but above a 1480 Ma line. Four hornblendes from amphibolitic dykes yield K-Ar ages between 864 and 804 Ma. Whole-rocks of the ‘red facies’ of the intrusive Mtuga Granite (nine samples) define an isochron of 607 ± 39 Ma with initial 87Sr/86Sr of 0.730 ± 0.005. The ‘white facies’ of the Mtuga Granite (four samples) and probably also the copper-bearing aplitic veins (seven samples) are of the same age, but with even higher initial 87Sr/86Sr ratios. Seven biotites from the Mkushi gneisses yield Rb-Sr and K-Ar ages between 469 Ma and 444 Ma. These data are interpreted to signal (1) about 1780 Ma ago: emplacement of the granitoid precursors of the Mkushi gneisses, derived from older continental material, (2) between about 1480 Ma and 860 Ma ago: formation of the Mkushi gneisses and the amphibolites (probably during the Irumide orogeny, about 1350 Ma ago); (3) between about 860 Ma and 800 Ma ago: closure of the hornblendes to K-Ar (490–550°C) after resetting (probably in relation to the c. 860 Ma old tectono-thermal event widespread in eastern and eastern-central Africa), (4) about 600 Ma ago: intrusion of the Mtuga Granite and the copper-bearing splites (post-tectonic Pan-African), possibly derived from the Mkushi gneisses, and (5) about 460-450 Ma ago: closure of the biotites to Rb-Sr and K-Ar (approximately 400°C), reflecting the final regional cooling (termination of the Pan-African events). Some regional implications are discussed.

Sedimentation in an intracratonic extensional basin; the Karoo of the central Morondava Basin, Madagascar

The late Carboniferous to Triassic Karoo Supergroup of Madagascar is a sequence of predominantly continental clastic sediments deposited during a long period of regional crustal extension. In the Morondava Basin of western Madagascar the lower two divisions of the Karoo sediments – the Sakoa and the Sakamena – are deposits of fluvial and lacustrine sedimentation systems supplied from the Precambrian metamorphic basement terrain to the east. East–west crustal extension produced a series of graben and half-graben structures after the Sakoa period which were reactivated after the Sakamena. The position and orientation of these half graben, which were marginal to a larger rift system to the west, were partly controlled by the steep NNE–SSW mylonitic fabric in the metamorphic basement. Palaeocurrents in the braided river deposits of the Sakoa and Lower Sakamena indicate flow to the southwest and west in both sequences. The rivers followed a regional palaeoslope to the southwest/west and were apparently not significantly influenced by the local structural trends which were oriented perpendicular to this slope. The absence of local structural control is attributed to extensive erosional events which followed each tectonic episode and preceded the onset of further sedimentation which took place on an essentially peneplained surface. The tectonic episodes brought about changes in base level which caused this part of the basin to fluctuate between erosion and deposition.

The lithospheric structure of Pangea

Lithospheric thickness of continents, obtained from Rayleigh wave tomography, is used to make maps of the lithospheric thickness of Pangea by reconstructing the continental arrangement in the Permian. This approach assumes that lithosphere moves with the overlying continents, and therefore that the arrangement of both can be obtained using the poles of rotation obtained from magnetic anomalies and fracture zones. The resulting reconstruction shows that a contiguous arc of thick lithosphere underlay most of eastern Pangea. Beneath the western convex side of this arc, there is a wide belt of thinner lithosphere underlying what is believed to have been the active margin of Pangea, here named the Pangeides. On the inner side of this arc is another large area of thin lithosphere beneath the Pan-African belts of North Africa and Arabia. The arc of thick lithosphere is crossed by bands of slightly thinner lithosphere that lie beneath the Pan-African and Brasiliano mobile belts of South America, Africa, India, Madagascar, and Antarctica. This geometry suggests that lithospheric thickness has an important influence on continental deformation and accretion.