2D Kinematic Models of Growth Fault‐Related Folds in Contractional Settings

Abstract

This chapter attempts to synthesize current understanding of various aspects of sedimentation and tectonics at the scale of fault-related folds with associated growth strata developed in contractional settings by using 2D kinematic models. The principal points are to examine the influence of various parameters in the growth stratal architecture in order to help choose the correct model for each circumstance within the wide range of possibilities, and to show what type of data may be obtained from the analysis of growth strata. The knowledge of growth stratal features should facilitate a better understanding of the geometry and evolution of structures, and can therefore benefit society from the perspective of helping hydrocarbon, mining, and groundwater subsurface exploration, and assessing earthquake hazards and underground storage.

Evolution of the Nourooz anticline (NW Persian Gulf) deciphered using growth strata: Structural inferences to constrain hydrocarbon exploration in Persian offshore anticlines

“…19 anticline supports this interpretation when compared with the models of growth anticlines formed by combination of hinge migration and limb rotation (Poblet & Hardy, 1995;Poblet, 2012). If processes such layer-parallel strain would have operated, this would have had some effects on the contribution of the different amplification mechanisms not taken into account in our analysis.…”

“…This hypothesis is not plausible since the Miocene does not thin in the anticline crestal area and thicken in the adjacent synclines. b) Growth strata rolling through limited-activity axial surfaces (typical of a limb rotation mechanism) from the anticline limbs towards the anticline crest causing a syncline in the crestal growth strata following the mechanism proposed by Poblet et al (1997), and Poblet (2012). c) Elevation of the anticline limbs with respect to the partly eroded anticline crest below the unconformity, due to amplification of the Nourooz anticline by flexural slip in the pre-growth strata, creating a syncline in the crestal growth strata over the unconformity similarly to Alonso (1989) mechanism.…”

Late Jurassic‐Early Cretaceous Deformation in the Western Yanshan Fold‐Thrust Belt: Insights From Syntectonic Sedimentation in the Chicheng Basin, North China

“…Growth strata packages (or syntectonic sedimentary rocks; Poblet, ) generally represent all the sedimentary beds deposited during tectonic deformation and have long been used for exploring the style, timing, and kinematics of structural deformations, especially fault‐related fold structures in orogenic belts (Storti & Poblet, ; Suppe et al, ; Lawton et al, ; Carrera & Munoz, ; Carrigan et al, ; Wang, Zhou, et al, ). Structural analyses were based on detailed mapping of both basement and basin fill and the systematic collection of deformed strata attitudes.…”

Syndepositional forced folding and related fluid plumbing above a magmatic laccolith: Insights from outcrop (Lower Cretaceous, Basque-Cantabrian Basin, western Pyrenees)

“…In the present case, the pattern of onlaps migrating toward the anticline, combined with a shallowing-upward geometry of limb dips in growth strata (sedimentary wedge; Fig. 4), is considered diagnostic of folding by progressive limb rotation (Hardy and Poblet, 1994;Shaw et al, 2004;Poblet, 2012), as opposed to instantaneous folding. Since fold growth is caused by magma emplacement, the intrusion would have been the result of either continuous steady infl ation or multiple magmatic pulses rather than a single intrusion event.…”

“…At this exceptional outcrop, a vertical succession allows for a two-dimensional (2-D) examination of the entire laccolith-forced fold-growth deposit system at a resolution that is around three orders of magnitude higher than state-ofthe-art seismic profi les. Growth strata have been used to defi ne the age, amplifi cation mechanism and rates, and kinematics of the forced fold following the techniques employed in synfolding sequences (e.g., Hardy and Poblet, 1994;Shaw et al, 2004;Poblet, 2012). In addition, sedimentological, petrological, and geochemical analyses of the growth deposits provide an insight into coeval fracturing and migration of overpressured, methane-rich fl uids triggered by the emplacement of the laccolith.…”