A Numerical Approach to the Interseismic Deformation in Nubia-Anatolia Convergence with New GPS Data in Cyprus and Southern Turkey
Abstract
Nubia-Anatolia convergence gives rise to a complicated tectonic system that has considerable variable deformation within the Eastern Mediterranean. While the subduction to the south of the Aegean causes widespread extension in both the Aegean and western Turkey, the tectonic framework is quite different to the east of the termination of the Hellenic Arc. Due to the fragmentation of the Nubian subduction and the collision of the Eratosthenes Seamount with Cyprus to the south of it, shortening, and not extension, dominates the regions to the north of the Cyprus Arc. However, the nature of the deformation in the zone has been difficult to image in detail because most of the deforming zones are offshore and the GPS data in Cyprus and the southern coast of the Anatolian peninsula have been sparse. In recent years, new tomographic studies provided detailed images of the crust and upper mantle in various N-S oriented profiles in Cyprus-Anatolia system. In this study we use tomographic images to construct a simple one-dimensional numerical model to simulate the simplified interseismic kinematics of the shortening and uplift of the Cyprus-Anatolia system. We use new GPS data both from Cyprus and southern Turkey to provide boundary conditions as well as internal constraints for our model. We support this 1-D model with a simple 2D kinematic model to shed some light on the lateral variation of the style of deformation in this zone. Our preliminary results show that the horizontal strain rates over Cyprus and Cilicia Basin are low, comparable, in terms of order of magnitude, to Central Turkey. On the other hand, there are major terrace uplifts all along the northern coast of Cyprus in the south and the Taurus range in the north possibly indicating a relatively long wavelength buckling deformation.
- Publication:
-
AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2020
- Bibcode:
- 2020AGUFMG017...10O
- Keywords:
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- 1209 Tectonic deformation;
- GEODESY AND GRAVITY;
- 1240 Satellite geodesy: results;
- GEODESY AND GRAVITY;
- 4302 Geological;
- NATURAL HAZARDS;
- 8107 Continental neotectonics;
- TECTONOPHYSICS