Southern Segment of the European Geotraverse — a wide-angle seismic refraction experiment in the Sardinia Channel

The Sardinia Channel dataset was collected as part of the European Geotraverse (EGT)—a 4000 km seismic refraction line running from Northern Norway to the Sahara, designed to investigate the structure of the lithosphere beneath Europe. Wideangle seismic data recorded by ocean bottom seismometers deployed in the Sardinia Channel as part of the Southern Segment of the EGT, together with gravity data, were used to constrain the final crustal model. In the centre of the Channel the crust is identified as thinned continental in nature, with a crystalline thickness of 10 km overlain by 4 km of sediments and 2.5 km of water in the most extended region. High velocities in the lower crust in the central region are thought to represent an area of underplating or intrusion by igneous material caused by extension related to the opening of the Tyrrhenian Sea. The crust overlies an anomalously low velocity upper mantle.     

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1674987113001382

The area from the Greater Caucasus to the southeast Turkey is characteri：;.ed and shaped by several major continental blocks. These are Scythian Platform, Pontian-Transcaucasu.,; Continent-Arc System （PTCAS）, the Anatolian-lranian and the Arabian Platforms. The aim of this paper is to define these continental blocks and describe and also compare their boundary relationships along the suture zones. The Scythian Platform displays the evidence of the Hercynian and Alpine orogens. This platform is separated from the PTCAS by the Greater Caucasus Suture Zone. The incipient collision began along this suture zone before middle-late Carboniferous whereas the final collision occurred before Oligocene. The PTCAS can be divided into four structural units： （1） the Georgian Block - northern part of the Pontian-Transcaucasian island-arc, （2） the southern and eastern Black Sea Coast-Adjara-Trialeti Unit, （3） the Artvin-Bolnisi Unit, comprising the northern part of the southern Transcaucasus, and （4） the Imbricated Bayburt-Garabagh Unit. The PTCAS could be separated from the Anatolian Iranian Platform by the North Anatolian-Lesser Caucasus Suture （NALCS） zone. The initial collision was developed in this suture zone during Senonian-early Eocene and final collision before middle Eocene or Oligocene-Miocene. The Anatolian-lranian Platform （AIP） is made up of the Tauride Platform and its metamorphic equivalents together with Iranian Platform. It could be separated from the Arabian Platform by the Southeastern Anatolian Suture （SEAS） zone. The collision ended before late Miocene along this suture zone. The southernmost continental block of the geotraverse is the Arabian Platform, which constitutes the northern part of the Arabian-African Plate. This platform includes a sequence from the Precambrian felsic volcanic and clastic rocks to the Campanian-early Maastrichtian fiyschoidal clastics. All the suture zones include MORB and SSZ-types ophiolites in different ages. However, the ages of the suture