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Extreme mantle uplift and exhumation along a transpressive transform fault

Nature Geoscience volume 9, pages 619–623 (2016)Cite this article

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Abstract

Mantle exhumation at slow-spreading ridges is favoured by extensional tectonics through low-angle detachment faults1,2,3,4, and, along transforms, by transtension due to changes in ridge/transform geometry5,6. Less common, exhumation by compressive stresses has been proposed for the large-offset transforms of the equatorial Atlantic7,8. Here we show, using high-resolution bathymetry, seismic and gravity data, that the northern transform fault of the St Paul system has been controlled by compressive deformation since ∼10 million years ago. The long-lived transpression resulted from ridge overlap due to the propagation of the northern Mid-Atlantic Ridge segment into the transform domain, which induced the migration and segmentation of the transform fault creating restraining stepovers. An anticlockwise change in plate motion at ∼11 million years ago5 initially favoured extension in the left-stepping transform, triggering the formation of a transverse ridge, later uplifted through transpression, forming the St Peter and St Paul islets. Enhanced melt supply at the ridge axis due to the nearby Sierra Leone thermo chemical anomaly9 is responsible for the robust response of the northern Mid-Atlantic Ridge segment to the kinematic change. The long-lived process at the origin of the compressive stresses is directly linked to the nature of the underlying mantle and not to a change in the far-field stress regime.

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Figure 1: Location and morphostructure of the St Paul shear zone.
Figure 2: Shaded bathymetry of three different portions of the northern St Paul shear zone.
Figure 3: Reflection seismic line crossing the St Paul shear zone.
Figure 4: Thickness map of a 2,800 kg m−3 density layer, which can correspond to crust and/or to altered mantle, derived from the gravity data and superimposed on a shaded high-resolution bathymetry.
Figure 5: Sketch of the evolution of the St Paul shear zone from a configuration before the change in plate motion at ∼11 Ma (top) to the present boundary geometry (bottom).

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Acknowledgements

The COLMEIA marine expedition was funded by the French Ministry of Research through the grant to the Flotte Océanographique Française. Additional supporting grants came from CNRS-INSU programme ‘Campagnes à la mer’, Labex MER and Région Bretagne, France, and from Universidade Federal Fluminense and CPRM, Brazil. M.L. acknowledges supporting grant PRIN 20125JKANY_002. We thank SECIRM, Brazilian Navy, for their help and support to this project. We are grateful to Captain G. Ferrand and his crew from RV L’Atalante and to the technical staff of GENAVIR for their help on acquiring the data presented here.

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Author notes

  1. Akihisa Motoki: Deceased.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratoire Domaines Océaniques, CNRS-Université de Bretagne Occidentale, IUEM, Rue Dumont d’Urville, 29280 Plouzané, France

    Marcia Maia, Nicolas Ferreira, Bérengère Mougel & Christophe Hémond

  2. LAGEMAR, Universidade Federal Fluminense, Av. Gal. Milton Tavares de Souza S/N, 24.210-340 Niteroi, Brazil

    Susanna Sichel, Isa Brehme, Eliane Alves, Arthur Ayres & Pedro Oliveira

  3. GET, Université de Toulouse, Avenue Edouard Belin, 31400 Toulouse, France

    Anne Briais

  4. Dipartimento di Scienze Chimiche e Geologiche, Università di Modena e Reggio Emilia, Via Campi 103, 41125 Modena, Italy

    Daniele Brunelli

  5. ISMAR—CNR—Geologia Marina, Via Gobetti, 101, 40129 Bologna, Italy

    Daniele Brunelli & Marco Ligi

  6. Departamento de Geologia, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte, Cidade Universitária—Lagoa Nova, CP 1639, 59072-700 Natal, Brazil

    Thomas Campos

  7. Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris, 1, Rue Jussieu, 75005 Paris, France

    Bérengère Mougel

  8. Instituto de Geociências, Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro, Centro de Tecnologia e Ciencias, Rua Sao Francisco, 20550-013 Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

    Akihisa Motoki

  9. Instituto de Astronomia, Geofísica e Ciências Atmosféricas, Universidade de Sao Paulo, Rua do Matão 1226, Cidade Universitária, 05508-090 São Paulo, Brazil

    Denise Moura

  10. Laboratoire d’Acoustique, IFREMER, Technopole Iroise, 29280 Plouzané, France

    Carla Scalabrin

  11. CPRM, Brazilian Geological Survey, Av. Pasteur, 404, 22290-255 Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

    Ivo Pessanha

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  1. Marcia Maia
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Contributions

M.M. and S.S. conceived the COLMEIA project. M.M. led the COLMEIA cruise. M.M., A.B. and D.B. acquired, processed and interpreted the different data sets and wrote the paper. M.L. provided complementary bathymetry data, processed and interpreted the different data sets and wrote the paper. N.F. interpreted the bathymetry data. E.A., A.A. and P.O. interpreted the seismic data for sediment thickness. D.M. built the crustal age model and acquired the data during the COLMEIA cruise. T.C., B.M., I.B., C.H., A.M., C.S. and I.P. acquired the data during the COLMEIA cruise.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Marcia Maia or Akihisa Motoki.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Maia, M., Sichel, S., Briais, A. et al. Extreme mantle uplift and exhumation along a transpressive transform fault. Nature Geosci 9, 619–623 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo2759

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