TY - JOUR
T1 - Continental Fragments in the South China Block
T2 - Constraints From Crustal Radial Anisotropy
AU - Li, Tingzi
AU - Jiang, Mingming
AU - Zhao, Liang
AU - Chu, Yang
AU - Yao, Weihua
AU - Wan, Bo
AU - Chen, Ling
AU - Ai, Yinshuang
AU - Bodin, Thomas
AU - Yuan, Huaiyu
N1 - Funding Information:
The authors would like to express their gratitude for the support provided by the National Natural Science Foundation of China through projects 91955210, 41625016 and 41888101. The transdimensional inversion was carried out at the Pawsey Supercomputing Centre with funding from the Australian Government and the Government of Western Australia. The authors thank two anonymous reviewers and the editor for very detailed comments and suggestions, which greatly inproved the quality of the manuscript. Prof. Jinhui Yang is thanked for the discussion of geochemical evidence about the CaB lithospheric thinning. HY publishes this work with the permission of the Executive Director, Geological Survey of Western Australia. Open access publishing facilitated by The University of Western Australia, as part of the Wiley ‐ The University of Western Australia agreement via the Council of Australian University Librarians.
Funding Information:
The authors would like to express their gratitude for the support provided by the National Natural Science Foundation of China through projects 91955210, 41625016 and 41888101. The transdimensional inversion was carried out at the Pawsey Supercomputing Centre with funding from the Australian Government and the Government of Western Australia. The authors thank two anonymous reviewers and the editor for very detailed comments and suggestions, which greatly inproved the quality of the manuscript. Prof. Jinhui Yang is thanked for the discussion of geochemical evidence about the CaB lithospheric thinning. HY publishes this work with the permission of the Executive Director, Geological Survey of Western Australia. Open access publishing facilitated by The University of Western Australia, as part of the Wiley - The University of Western Australia agreement via the Council of Australian University Librarians.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2023 The Authors.
PY - 2023/10
Y1 - 2023/10
N2 - The lithospheric architecture of the South China Block (SCB) is crucial to understanding the formation and evolution of this distinctive and highly reworked continental lithosphere with over 3 billion years of tectonic history. However, due to a lack of high-resolution geophysical datasets, a detailed picture of the SCB lithosphere is absent, and fundamental questions regarding its formation, assembly, and subsequent reworking processes are actively debated. Assuming that unique deformation patterns due to such tectonic processes can be mapped by seismic anisotropy, we present a new crustal radially anisotropic shear-wave velocity model along a 1500-km seismic transect that spans the major tectonic domains of the SCB to characterize the past deformation processes. The new seismic models show significant lateral variations in seismic anisotropy and velocity, suggesting that the SCB consists of several separated (micro)continental blocks or terranes that likely have different origins and have survived the prolonged deformation history since the early formation of these continental fragments. Combining available geophysical datasets, we link individual crustal domains of distinct anisotropy to constrain the multiphase deformation processes of the SCB, including the early formation of the Proto-Yangtze and Cathaysia Blocks, the assembly of the SCB, and the subsequent reactivation of the interior and extensive deformation that have formed the Basin-and-Range style tectonics in the Cathaysia Block. We suggest that relict continental fragments have played critical roles in the formation and reactivation of the SCB lithosphere.
AB - The lithospheric architecture of the South China Block (SCB) is crucial to understanding the formation and evolution of this distinctive and highly reworked continental lithosphere with over 3 billion years of tectonic history. However, due to a lack of high-resolution geophysical datasets, a detailed picture of the SCB lithosphere is absent, and fundamental questions regarding its formation, assembly, and subsequent reworking processes are actively debated. Assuming that unique deformation patterns due to such tectonic processes can be mapped by seismic anisotropy, we present a new crustal radially anisotropic shear-wave velocity model along a 1500-km seismic transect that spans the major tectonic domains of the SCB to characterize the past deformation processes. The new seismic models show significant lateral variations in seismic anisotropy and velocity, suggesting that the SCB consists of several separated (micro)continental blocks or terranes that likely have different origins and have survived the prolonged deformation history since the early formation of these continental fragments. Combining available geophysical datasets, we link individual crustal domains of distinct anisotropy to constrain the multiphase deformation processes of the SCB, including the early formation of the Proto-Yangtze and Cathaysia Blocks, the assembly of the SCB, and the subsequent reactivation of the interior and extensive deformation that have formed the Basin-and-Range style tectonics in the Cathaysia Block. We suggest that relict continental fragments have played critical roles in the formation and reactivation of the SCB lithosphere.
KW - ambient noise tomography
KW - continental fragments
KW - crustal radial anisotropy
KW - lithosphere architecture
KW - south China block
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85174592254&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1029/2023JB026998
DO - 10.1029/2023JB026998
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85174592254
SN - 2169-9313
VL - 128
JO - Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth
JF - Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth
IS - 10
M1 - e2023JB026998
ER -