Date

2017-11-01

Author

Abgarmi, Bizhan
Delph, Jonathan R.
Özacar, Atilla Arda
Beck, Susan L.
Zandt, George
Sandvol, Eric
TÜRKELLİ, NİYAZİ
Biryol, C. Berk

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The central Anatolian plateau in Turkey is a region with a long history of subduction, continental collision, accretion of continental fragments, and slab tearing and/or breakoff and tectonic escape. Central Anatolia is currently characterized as a nascent plateau with widespread Neogene volcanism and predominantly transtensional deformation. To elucidate the present-day crustal and upper mantle structure of this region, teleseismic receiver functions were calculated from 500 seismic events recorded on 92 temporary and permanent broadband seismic stations. Overall, we see a good correlation between crustal thickness and elevation throughout central Anatolia, indicating that the crust may be well compensated throughout the region. We observe the thickest crust beneath the Taurus Mountains (>40 km); it thins rapidly to the south in the Adana Basin and Arabian plate and to the northwest across the Inner Tauride suture beneath the Tuz Golu Basin and Kirsehir block. Within the Central Anatolian Volcanic Province, we observe several low seismic velocity layers ranging from 15 to 25 km depth that spatially correlate with the Neogene volcanism in the region, and may represent crustal magma reservoirs. Beneath the central Taurus Mountains, we observe a positive amplitude, subhorizontal receiver function arrival below the Anatolian continental Moho at similar to 50-80 km that we interpret as the gently dipping Moho of the subducting African lithosphere abruptly ending near the northernmost extent of the central Taurus Mountains. We suggest that the uplift of the central Taurus Mountains (similar to 2 km since 8 Ma), which are capped by flat-lying carbonates of late Miocene marine units, can be explained by an isostatic uplift during the late Miocene-Pliocene followed by slab breakoff and subsequent rebound coeval with the onset of faster uplift rates during the late Pliocene-early Pleistocene. The Moho signature of the subducting African lithosphere terminates near the southernmost extent of the Central Anatolian Volcanic Province, where geochemical signatures in the Quaternary volcanics indicate that asthenospheric material is rising to shallow mantle depths.

Subject Keywords

Stratigraphy, Geology

URI

https://hdl.handle.net/11511/37157

Collections

Department of Geological Engineering, Article