Successive Extensional Tectonic Regimes during the Mesozoic as Evidenced by Neptunian Dikes in the Pontide Magmatic Arc,Northeast Turkey

The eastern Pontide magmatic arc extends ～600 km in an E-W direction along the Black Sea coast and was disrupted by a series of fault systems trending NE-SW, NW-SE, E-W, and N-S. These fault systems are responsible for the formation of diachronous extensional basins, rift or pull-apart, in the northern, southern, and axial zones of the eastern Pontides during the Mesozoic. Successive extensional or transtensional tectonic regimes caused the abortive Liassic rift basins and the Albian and Campanian pull-apart basins with deep-spreading troughs in the southern and axial zones. Liassic, Albian, and Campanian neptunian dikes, which indicate extensional tectonic regimes, crop out within the Paleozoic granites near Kale, Gumushane, and the Malm–Lower Cretaceous platform carbonates in Amasya and Gumushane. These neptunian dikes correspond to extensional cracks that are filled and overlain by the fossiliferous red pelagic limestones. Multidirectional Liassic neptunian dikes are consistent with the general trend of the paleofaults (NE-SW, NW-SE, and E-W), and active dextral North Anatolian fault (NAF) and sinistral Northeast Anatolian fault (NEAF) systems. The Albian neptunian dikes in Amasya formed in the synthetic oblique left-lateral normal faults of the main fault zone that runs parallel to the active North Anatolian fault zone (NAFZ).

Kinematic interpretation of the Liassic and Albian neptunian dikes suggests N-S extensional stress or northward movement of the Pontides along the conjugate fracture zones parallel to the NAFZ and NEAFZ. This northward movement of the Pontides in Liassic and Albian times requires left-lateral and right-lateral slips along the conjugate NAFZ and Northeast Anatolian fault zones (NEAFZ), respectively, in contrast to the recent active tectonics that have been accommodated by N-S compressional stress. On the other hand, mutual relationships between the neptunian dikes and the associated main fault zone of Campanian age extending in an E-W direction in the Kale area, Gumushane suggest the existence of a main left-lateral transtensional wrench zone. This system might be accommodated by the counterclockwise convergence of the Turkish plate with the Afro-Arabian plate relative to the Eurasian plate, and the southward oblique subduction of Paleotethys beneath the eastern Pontide magmatic arc during the Mesozoic.