The Marmara Sea basin should be considered to form part of the North Anatolian Fault (NAF) and th... more The Marmara Sea basin should be considered to form part of the North Anatolian Fault (NAF) and the Aegean crustal regime in which a listric-faulted upper crustal section overlies a lower crust that was thinned in a ductile manner, the overall crustal thickness being about 25-30 km. The local Moho upbulge of about 5 km is consistent with Bouguer gravity anomalies as shown by modelling. As the North Aegean area, the Sea of Marmara is undergoing a combination of right-lateral strike-slip and north-south extension with the formation of pull-apart basins. As a result of the collision of the Arabian and Anatolian land masses during the Middle Miocene, the westward escape of the Anatolian block gave rise to E-W compression in western Turkey, the relief of which was produced by N-S extension. In northern Turkey and towards the North Aegean Sea: the NAF splits into several fault strands defining a broad tectonic zone with associated high swarmlike seismic activity. The Marmara Sea basin is the extension of the Thrace basin in the north and northwest. During the Middle Eocene, the subsidence of basement occurred, creating the Thrace basin. Therefore it could be assumed that the extensional basins of the Sea of Marmara have existed since the Eocene. According to interpretation of geological, geomorphological and geophysical data, the Sea of Marmara can be divided into five different blocks which are controlled by two sets of fault systems: (i) almost E-W trending normal faults (the Northern and Southern Boundary faults); and (ii) NE-SW oriented subvertical strike-slips. The blocks are undergoing relative vertical motions and rotations. The Marmara Sea basin accommodates strike-slip and extensional movements. The east-west trending normal fault systems of the Sea of Marmara is a diffuse zone of crustal thinning associated with an estimated 30 percent of north-south extension since the Tortonian.
The Eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East make up the southern boundary of the Tethys Ocean f... more The Eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East make up the southern boundary of the Tethys Ocean for the last 200 Ma by the disintegration of the Pangaea and closure of the Tethys Ocean. It covers the structures: Hellenic and Cyprus arcs; Eastern Anatolian Fault Zone; Bitlis Suture Zone and Zagros Mountains. The northern boundary of the Tethys Ocean is made up the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, and it extends up to Po valley towards the west (Pontides, Caucasus). Between these two zones the Alp-Himalayan orogenic belt is situated where the Balkan, Anatolia and the Iran plateaus are placed as the remnants of the lost Ocean of the Tethys. The active tectonics of the eastern Mediterranean is the consequences of the convergence between the Africa, Arabian plates in the south and the Eurasian plate in the north. These plates act as converging jaws of vise forming a crustal mosaic in between. The active crustal deformation pattern reveals two N-S trending maximum compression or crustal sho...
ABSTRACT Recent geological and geophysical data indicate that the Black Sea has been an area of r... more ABSTRACT Recent geological and geophysical data indicate that the Black Sea has been an area of recent subsidence accompanied by active tectonics. The Quaternary sequence started with the marine Akçağlayan transgression in this region. Transgressions and regressions have determined the facies pattern of the Black Sea sediments during the Quaternary period witnessed a series of glacial and interglacial events accompanied by widespread tectonism. The interval sedimentation rate varied between 0.1 – 0.6 m/ka for the period 5.3 – 0.7 ma but increased sharply to 1.2 – 1.3 m/ka starting with Cromerian. With the formation and evolution of stratified waters of the Black Sea from pynocline changes, a wide variety of transition structures between sapropel and seekreide extremes came into existence. Fluctuations in the O2 - H2S interface were most likely to have been brought about by climatic changes and/or subsidence of the basin. Under these conditions three stages of element enrichment can be expected in the Black Sea as: (i) caused by biological processes under stagnant conditions; (ii) enrichment occuring at the seawater-sediment boundary; (iii) activation of metallic components in the sediments with the aid of marine geochemical processes.
In present day, eastern Mediterranean is controlled by the collision of the African and Eurasian ... more In present day, eastern Mediterranean is controlled by the collision of the African and Eurasian plates and displacements of Arabian, Anatolian and Aegean micro-plates. The boundary between African and Eurasian plates is delineated by the Hellenic arc and Pliny-Strabo trench in the west and the Cyprus arc and a diffuse fault system of the Eastern Anatolian Fault zone in the
Page 1. Relation of Alkaline Volcanism and Active Tectonism within the Evolution of the Isparta A... more Page 1. Relation of Alkaline Volcanism and Active Tectonism within the Evolution of the Isparta Angle, SW Turkey1 Fuzuli Yagmurlu, Yilmaz Sava§in,2 and Mustafa Ergfin3 Department of Geology, Stileyman Demirel University, Isparta, Turkey ABSTRACT ...
The Marmara sea region of NW Turkey is a tectonically extremely active area. Large, and also freq... more The Marmara sea region of NW Turkey is a tectonically extremely active area. Large, and also frequent, earthquakes are triggered by the influence of the westward moving Anatolian platform along the North Anatolian Fault Zone (NAFZ) and the extensional part of the Aegean plate which combine to form a transtensional tectonic regime. The apparently rigid character of the Black Sea oceanic lithosphere also provides a simple explanation for the deviation of the NAF (North Anatolian Fault) from the small circle path in western Turkey. The depth of the crust-mantle boundary is expected to be around 30 km or less in the Marmara sea region. This boundary is around 20 km in the Western Black sea. Along the southern Black sea margin a passive margin sedimentary prism developed during the post-arc period since the Maastrichtian. Owing to the compressional regime affecting the region after the closing of the Intra-Pontide Suture most of the Western Pontides were uplifted during the Late Eocene. ...
Copyright 1999, Offshore Technology Conference This paper was prepared for presentation at the 19... more Copyright 1999, Offshore Technology Conference This paper was prepared for presentation at the 1999 Offshore Technology Conference held in Houston, Texas, 36 May 1999. This paper was selected for presentation by the OTC Program Committee following review of ...
The Black Sea, one of the largest inland seas in the world lying at the junction between Europe a... more The Black Sea, one of the largest inland seas in the world lying at the junction between Europe and Asia, is both oceanographically and geologically unique. Off the shelf, the water depth quickly plunges to an average depth of 2 km making it unusually deep for what would normally be termed a marginal sea. Methane seeps are a common feature around the basin, and mud volcanoes have been identified. It has been suggested that shelf and slope sediments of high deposition rate are methane sources, whereas the deep basin is methane sink. Slope failures and sediment instability are serious that can lead to the failure of offshore installations. In the deep basin mud volcano eruptions are almost certainly formed by breakdown of methane hydrate on a huge scale. Recent studies in marine geology indicates potential geo-resources in the Black Sea. Marine geophysical surveys were carried out in order to find out all obstacles and potential geohazards in the eastern Black Sea. Several different structures were observed in the Black Sea basin as slumps, slumping, pockmarks, faults, mud volcanoes, diapirs and dome-like structures. Structures, which contain gas hydrates are present on the profiler records as strong acoustic reflections. Introduction The Black Sea is one of the world's largest marginal sea having anoxic conditions below 80-120 m, with an area of about 432 000 km2 and a volume of 534 000 km3(Fig.1). The Black Sea is connected to the Mediterranean Sea via the Sea of Marmara and the shallow Bosphorus and Dardanelles straits. Basically, the Black Sea occupies an oval basin between the folded Alpine belts of the Caucasus and Crimea to the north and northeast and the Pontus Mountains. It was found from the interpretation of seismic reflection data1 that is quite evident that the lower part of the southern margin of Black Sea basin generally preserves the extensive tectonics associated with the rift process that generated the Black Sea. Frequently the compressive deformation was superimposed on pre-existing distensive faults, which commenced their activity in the Upper Cretaceous or at the end of the Mesozoic and continued into the Paleocene. The uplift and subsidence described is an extensive phenomenon traceable to regional tectonics of the Tethys belt2. The mechanism of the immense subsidence of the Black Sea basin has given way to the deposition of the thick sedimentary sequence. The Black Sea comprises two extensional basins formed in a back-arc setting above the northward subducting Tethys Ocean, close to the southern margin of Eurasia. Two basins coalesced late in their post-rift phases in the Pliocene, forming the present single depocentre. Off the shelf, the water depth quickly deepens down to an average depth of 2 km making it unusually deep for what would normally be termed a marginal sea. The Black Sea basin lies within the Cimmeride/Alpine fold belt on the Eurasian tectonic plate. To the south it is bordered by the Turkish micro-plate or crustal block. The mountain-building processes and their subsequent erosion around the basin have contributed to a high sediment input. Seismic studies indicate a 15 km thick blanket of sediments with unusually low seismic velocities (3.0-4.5 km/s) that reach potentially back to the Early Cretaceous (130-110 Ma). Although there is excessive supply of terrigenous sediment (exceed 100 million tones per annum) in the Black Sea, pelagic sedimentation plays the major role in the deep basin (the total abyssal sedimentation is about 10 cm/k). These sediments are rich in calcite and organic carbon3, the latter showing a high degree of preservation due to anoxia in waters below 100-150 m. P
The Black Sea is one of the largest inland seas in the world. Off the shelf, the water depth quic... more The Black Sea is one of the largest inland seas in the world. Off the shelf, the water depth quickly plunges to an average depth of 2 km. The Black Sea sediments are rich in calcite and organic carbon, the latter showing a high degree of preservation due to anoxia in the waters below 100-150 m. Slope failures and sediment
The Marmara Sea basin should be considered to form part of the North Anatolian Fault (NAF) and th... more The Marmara Sea basin should be considered to form part of the North Anatolian Fault (NAF) and the Aegean crustal regime in which a listric-faulted upper crustal section overlies a lower crust that was thinned in a ductile manner, the overall crustal thickness being about 25-30 km. The local Moho upbulge of about 5 km is consistent with Bouguer gravity anomalies as shown by modelling. As the North Aegean area, the Sea of Marmara is undergoing a combination of right-lateral strike-slip and north-south extension with the formation of pull-apart basins. As a result of the collision of the Arabian and Anatolian land masses during the Middle Miocene, the westward escape of the Anatolian block gave rise to E-W compression in western Turkey, the relief of which was produced by N-S extension. In northern Turkey and towards the North Aegean Sea: the NAF splits into several fault strands defining a broad tectonic zone with associated high swarmlike seismic activity. The Marmara Sea basin is the extension of the Thrace basin in the north and northwest. During the Middle Eocene, the subsidence of basement occurred, creating the Thrace basin. Therefore it could be assumed that the extensional basins of the Sea of Marmara have existed since the Eocene. According to interpretation of geological, geomorphological and geophysical data, the Sea of Marmara can be divided into five different blocks which are controlled by two sets of fault systems: (i) almost E-W trending normal faults (the Northern and Southern Boundary faults); and (ii) NE-SW oriented subvertical strike-slips. The blocks are undergoing relative vertical motions and rotations. The Marmara Sea basin accommodates strike-slip and extensional movements. The east-west trending normal fault systems of the Sea of Marmara is a diffuse zone of crustal thinning associated with an estimated 30 percent of north-south extension since the Tortonian.
The Eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East make up the southern boundary of the Tethys Ocean f... more The Eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East make up the southern boundary of the Tethys Ocean for the last 200 Ma by the disintegration of the Pangaea and closure of the Tethys Ocean. It covers the structures: Hellenic and Cyprus arcs; Eastern Anatolian Fault Zone; Bitlis Suture Zone and Zagros Mountains. The northern boundary of the Tethys Ocean is made up the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, and it extends up to Po valley towards the west (Pontides, Caucasus). Between these two zones the Alp-Himalayan orogenic belt is situated where the Balkan, Anatolia and the Iran plateaus are placed as the remnants of the lost Ocean of the Tethys. The active tectonics of the eastern Mediterranean is the consequences of the convergence between the Africa, Arabian plates in the south and the Eurasian plate in the north. These plates act as converging jaws of vise forming a crustal mosaic in between. The active crustal deformation pattern reveals two N-S trending maximum compression or crustal sho...
ABSTRACT Recent geological and geophysical data indicate that the Black Sea has been an area of r... more ABSTRACT Recent geological and geophysical data indicate that the Black Sea has been an area of recent subsidence accompanied by active tectonics. The Quaternary sequence started with the marine Akçağlayan transgression in this region. Transgressions and regressions have determined the facies pattern of the Black Sea sediments during the Quaternary period witnessed a series of glacial and interglacial events accompanied by widespread tectonism. The interval sedimentation rate varied between 0.1 – 0.6 m/ka for the period 5.3 – 0.7 ma but increased sharply to 1.2 – 1.3 m/ka starting with Cromerian. With the formation and evolution of stratified waters of the Black Sea from pynocline changes, a wide variety of transition structures between sapropel and seekreide extremes came into existence. Fluctuations in the O2 - H2S interface were most likely to have been brought about by climatic changes and/or subsidence of the basin. Under these conditions three stages of element enrichment can be expected in the Black Sea as: (i) caused by biological processes under stagnant conditions; (ii) enrichment occuring at the seawater-sediment boundary; (iii) activation of metallic components in the sediments with the aid of marine geochemical processes.
In present day, eastern Mediterranean is controlled by the collision of the African and Eurasian ... more In present day, eastern Mediterranean is controlled by the collision of the African and Eurasian plates and displacements of Arabian, Anatolian and Aegean micro-plates. The boundary between African and Eurasian plates is delineated by the Hellenic arc and Pliny-Strabo trench in the west and the Cyprus arc and a diffuse fault system of the Eastern Anatolian Fault zone in the
Page 1. Relation of Alkaline Volcanism and Active Tectonism within the Evolution of the Isparta A... more Page 1. Relation of Alkaline Volcanism and Active Tectonism within the Evolution of the Isparta Angle, SW Turkey1 Fuzuli Yagmurlu, Yilmaz Sava§in,2 and Mustafa Ergfin3 Department of Geology, Stileyman Demirel University, Isparta, Turkey ABSTRACT ...
The Marmara sea region of NW Turkey is a tectonically extremely active area. Large, and also freq... more The Marmara sea region of NW Turkey is a tectonically extremely active area. Large, and also frequent, earthquakes are triggered by the influence of the westward moving Anatolian platform along the North Anatolian Fault Zone (NAFZ) and the extensional part of the Aegean plate which combine to form a transtensional tectonic regime. The apparently rigid character of the Black Sea oceanic lithosphere also provides a simple explanation for the deviation of the NAF (North Anatolian Fault) from the small circle path in western Turkey. The depth of the crust-mantle boundary is expected to be around 30 km or less in the Marmara sea region. This boundary is around 20 km in the Western Black sea. Along the southern Black sea margin a passive margin sedimentary prism developed during the post-arc period since the Maastrichtian. Owing to the compressional regime affecting the region after the closing of the Intra-Pontide Suture most of the Western Pontides were uplifted during the Late Eocene. ...
Copyright 1999, Offshore Technology Conference This paper was prepared for presentation at the 19... more Copyright 1999, Offshore Technology Conference This paper was prepared for presentation at the 1999 Offshore Technology Conference held in Houston, Texas, 36 May 1999. This paper was selected for presentation by the OTC Program Committee following review of ...
The Black Sea, one of the largest inland seas in the world lying at the junction between Europe a... more The Black Sea, one of the largest inland seas in the world lying at the junction between Europe and Asia, is both oceanographically and geologically unique. Off the shelf, the water depth quickly plunges to an average depth of 2 km making it unusually deep for what would normally be termed a marginal sea. Methane seeps are a common feature around the basin, and mud volcanoes have been identified. It has been suggested that shelf and slope sediments of high deposition rate are methane sources, whereas the deep basin is methane sink. Slope failures and sediment instability are serious that can lead to the failure of offshore installations. In the deep basin mud volcano eruptions are almost certainly formed by breakdown of methane hydrate on a huge scale. Recent studies in marine geology indicates potential geo-resources in the Black Sea. Marine geophysical surveys were carried out in order to find out all obstacles and potential geohazards in the eastern Black Sea. Several different structures were observed in the Black Sea basin as slumps, slumping, pockmarks, faults, mud volcanoes, diapirs and dome-like structures. Structures, which contain gas hydrates are present on the profiler records as strong acoustic reflections. Introduction The Black Sea is one of the world's largest marginal sea having anoxic conditions below 80-120 m, with an area of about 432 000 km2 and a volume of 534 000 km3(Fig.1). The Black Sea is connected to the Mediterranean Sea via the Sea of Marmara and the shallow Bosphorus and Dardanelles straits. Basically, the Black Sea occupies an oval basin between the folded Alpine belts of the Caucasus and Crimea to the north and northeast and the Pontus Mountains. It was found from the interpretation of seismic reflection data1 that is quite evident that the lower part of the southern margin of Black Sea basin generally preserves the extensive tectonics associated with the rift process that generated the Black Sea. Frequently the compressive deformation was superimposed on pre-existing distensive faults, which commenced their activity in the Upper Cretaceous or at the end of the Mesozoic and continued into the Paleocene. The uplift and subsidence described is an extensive phenomenon traceable to regional tectonics of the Tethys belt2. The mechanism of the immense subsidence of the Black Sea basin has given way to the deposition of the thick sedimentary sequence. The Black Sea comprises two extensional basins formed in a back-arc setting above the northward subducting Tethys Ocean, close to the southern margin of Eurasia. Two basins coalesced late in their post-rift phases in the Pliocene, forming the present single depocentre. Off the shelf, the water depth quickly deepens down to an average depth of 2 km making it unusually deep for what would normally be termed a marginal sea. The Black Sea basin lies within the Cimmeride/Alpine fold belt on the Eurasian tectonic plate. To the south it is bordered by the Turkish micro-plate or crustal block. The mountain-building processes and their subsequent erosion around the basin have contributed to a high sediment input. Seismic studies indicate a 15 km thick blanket of sediments with unusually low seismic velocities (3.0-4.5 km/s) that reach potentially back to the Early Cretaceous (130-110 Ma). Although there is excessive supply of terrigenous sediment (exceed 100 million tones per annum) in the Black Sea, pelagic sedimentation plays the major role in the deep basin (the total abyssal sedimentation is about 10 cm/k). These sediments are rich in calcite and organic carbon3, the latter showing a high degree of preservation due to anoxia in waters below 100-150 m. P
The Black Sea is one of the largest inland seas in the world. Off the shelf, the water depth quic... more The Black Sea is one of the largest inland seas in the world. Off the shelf, the water depth quickly plunges to an average depth of 2 km. The Black Sea sediments are rich in calcite and organic carbon, the latter showing a high degree of preservation due to anoxia in the waters below 100-150 m. Slope failures and sediment
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