Morphology of a Pre-collisional, Salt-bearing, Accretionary Complex: The Mediterranean Ridge (Eastern Mediterranean) |
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Authors: | C Huguen N Chamot-Rooke B Loubrieu J Mascle |
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Institution: | (1) UMR 6526 Géosciences-Azur, Observatoire Océanologique de Villefranche-sur-Mer, BP 4806235, Villefranche-sur-Mer Cedex, France;(2) LEGEM, Université de Perpignan, 52 Avenue de Villeneuve, 66860 Perpignan Cedex, France;(3) Laboratoire de Géologie, CNRS-UMR 8538, Ecole Normale Supérieure, 24 rue Lhomond, 75231 Paris Cedex 05, France;(4) IFREMER, DRO/GM, BP 7029270, Plouzane, France |
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Abstract: | The Eastern Mediterranean Sea is a remnant of a deep Mesozoic oceanic basin, now almost totally consumed as a result of long-term
plate convergence between Eurasia and Africa. The present-day surface morphology of the Eastern Mediterranean relates both
to the early history of formation of the deep basins and the recent geodynamic interactions between interfering microplates.
Among the most conspicuous morphologic features of the basin is an arc-shape, elongated and wide, bathymetric swell bisecting
the entire basin from the Ionian to Levantine areas, known as the Mediterranean Ridge. During the last decade this tectono-sedimentary
accretionary prism, which results from the Hellenic subduction, has been intensively surveyed by swath mapping, multichannel
seismic profiling and deep dives. We present here, and briefly discuss, the main morphological characteristics of this feature
as derived from swath bathymetric data that considerably help to better assess the lateral and north–south morphostructural
variability of the Mediterranean Ridge. This study reveals that the characteristics and morphostructural variability of the
Mediterranean Ridge are related to: (1) a specific incipient collision geodynamic setting south of Crete, where the African
and Aegean continental margins are nearly in contact, (2) a unique regional kinematics, controlled by frontal convergence
south of Crete (central Mediterranean Ridge) and oblique subduction with opposite sense of shear for the western (Ionian)
and eastern (Levantine) domains of the Mediterranean Ridge, that explain the lateral variations of deformation and (3) particularities
of its sedimentary cover, which includes massive salt layers within the outer Mediterranean Ridge and local salt deposits
within the inner domains, that control the north–south morphostructural variability of the sedimentary wedge. |
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Keywords: | Eastern Mediterranean multibeam data Mediterranean Ridge subduction |
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