Tectonics
Hamid Nazari; Jean-Francois Ritz; Ara Avagyan
Abstract
The Alborz mountain range accommodates some of the convergence between Central Iran and Eurasia. At present, the kinematics of the range involves a strain partitioning mechanism, and is associated with clockwise rotation of the South Caspian Basin. left-lateral strike-slip faulting is present along the ...
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The Alborz mountain range accommodates some of the convergence between Central Iran and Eurasia. At present, the kinematics of the range involves a strain partitioning mechanism, and is associated with clockwise rotation of the South Caspian Basin. left-lateral strike-slip faulting is present along the entire of its central part, while reverse faulting is affects its northern and southern borders. Several slip-rate studies have been carried out along active faults in the internal and southern parts of the range. Our analysis provides new constraints on the activity of this important active thrust fault. We show that the fault generally is a hidden thrust fault, often associated with fault-bend and fault-propagation folds (forebergs). In the central part of the fault near Chamestan, radiocarbon dating on an old elevated terrace allows estimating the minimum vertical slip of 2.0± 0.5 mm / year. Considering a 34 degree slope for the fault, the minimum horizontal slip rate will be 3 mm/yr and the minimum slip rate along the fault plane will be up to 3.6 mm / year. Our results confirm that the Khazar Fault is a major active structure in northern Iran, and represents a significant seismic hazard for the entire Central Alborz region.
S Eslami Farsani; M Talebian; A Saidi; M Pourkermani
Abstract
The purpose of this research is to study active faulting in western part of the Middle East, between Caspian Sea to the east and Mediterranean Sea to the west. This region covers several countries and thus geological maps have different scale and errors in locations. The mismatch between fault traces ...
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The purpose of this research is to study active faulting in western part of the Middle East, between Caspian Sea to the east and Mediterranean Sea to the west. This region covers several countries and thus geological maps have different scale and errors in locations. The mismatch between fault traces in geological maps with their actual position on the ground is sometimes up to several hundred meters. The main goal of this study was to prepare continues map of active faults together with seismicity for the entire region of interest. This map also shows the slip rate of the active faults, estimated based on available geodetic measurements (GPS) or other published data. All available information including geological maps, satellite images, topographic data, GPS measurements, and earthquake data were imported into Arc GIS system. The Landsat 7 satellite images were used to correct location of active faults and measuring young offsets along the faults. Most of active faults bound the mountains implying that they control current topography of the region. The earthquakes are more frequent in the Zagros, especially in western part, around junction of the North and East Anatolian faults. This is in contrast with the Dead Sea region where lower seismic activity observed. However larger earthquakes are distributed over entire region, though we have more record of historical earthquakes in NW Iran, Eastern Turkey and the Dead Sea region probably related to documentation of historical data rather than occurence of earthquakes. In the eastern Zagros (NW of Iran) total shortening is partitioned into pure strike-slip and thrusting. In the middle part (eastern Turkey) the Zagros trends east-west and most of shortening is taken up by pure thrusting. The Central and Eastern Turkey is dominated by strike-slip faults and rotation of blocks. Shortening across left-lateral and right-lateral systems in eastern Turkey cause the Turkish block to move to the west and subduct in Hellenic trench. Comparing rate of shortening with moment released by earthquakes in Zagros and Caucuses suggest that part of shortening is taking up by creep.
H Amini; M Fattahi; M.R Ghassemi
Abstract
The Doruneh fault is the second longest fault systems in Iran. This fault is 700 km long and extended from the Afghanistan-Iran border to the central Iran desert. Despite of its length, and position in the convergence zone between the Arabian and Eurasian plates and its seismic potential, only one historical ...
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The Doruneh fault is the second longest fault systems in Iran. This fault is 700 km long and extended from the Afghanistan-Iran border to the central Iran desert. Despite of its length, and position in the convergence zone between the Arabian and Eurasian plates and its seismic potential, only one historical earthquake (M>7) and two instrumental (M>6) earthquakes are recorded on this fault. Therefore, study of this fault is very important for evaluation of its seismic hazard. In our study, we used the Landsat images, aerial photographs, topography maps, geological maps and field work data to identify and estimate the amount of displacements of rivers, rock units, and some alluvial fans along this fault. Three branches of the Doruneh fault investigated in this study, named as the north, middle and south branches according to their geographical locations. This study demonstrates that both of the maximum and minimum fault displacements have occurred on the southern branch. Furthermore, the amount of displacements of the rivers, which have cut the alluvial fans during the Quaternary period, suggests that this branch, particularly between 57˚00΄ and 58˚50΄E, is more active than the other branches. Although, several slip rates were previously determined using different methods for some parts of this fault by the authors and other researchers, we suggest further dating and geodetic methods in the same regions and other part of the fault to estimate and compare the slip rate of different branches of this important fault.
M. Talebian
Abstract
The north east of Iran, extending from central Alborz to Kopeh Dagh Mountains, is one of the most seismically active regions of Iran. Several large and ancient cities are located in this region and thus provide relatively reach documented history of earthquakes. Numerous active faults have been known ...
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The north east of Iran, extending from central Alborz to Kopeh Dagh Mountains, is one of the most seismically active regions of Iran. Several large and ancient cities are located in this region and thus provide relatively reach documented history of earthquakes. Numerous active faults have been known in this area, some of them have already been under geological investigations, yet many needs to be studied. However, recent geodetic measurements provide a general view about rates of strike slip and shortening across the region. This study evaluates potential of implementing geologic and geodetic data in seismic hazard assessment in this part of Iran. To achieve this, the region of study has been divided to 5 structural zones. The moment accumulating rate was then calculated for each zone using both geological and geodetic measurements. This moment has been compared with moment released by earthquakes. Comparison of seismic moment released by instrumental and historical earthquakes with moment accumulating rate along major active faults suggest that geologic and geodetic data can be considered as a reliable source of information in seismic hazard analysis, especially where there is no sufficient record of earthquakes in the catalogs.
M Foroutan; H. Nazari; B. Meyer; M. Sébrier; M. Fattahi; K. Le Dortz; M. Ghorashi; Kh. Hessami; M. R. Ghassemi; M. Talebian
Abstract
The evaluation of seismic potential along the Dehshir fault with 550-km length (by count of northern and southern splays) is critical considering that more than 3.5 million people live in cities and towns located at vicinity of the fault. The Dehshir fault is considered as westernmost limit ...
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The evaluation of seismic potential along the Dehshir fault with 550-km length (by count of northern and southern splays) is critical considering that more than 3.5 million people live in cities and towns located at vicinity of the fault. The Dehshir fault is considered as westernmost limit of N-striking dextral strike-slip faults set that slice Central and eastern Iran. Due to the lack of large recorded earthquakes (instrumental and historical) in Central Iran, access to seismic potential of active faults by studying the earthquake catalogs seems to be impossible. No instrumental earthquake has been recorded greater than mb 4.7 around the Dehshir fault and also historical data shows no evidence for occurrence of large earthquake around the fault. No sign of destruction in Marvast historical castle (at a less than 10 km far from the Dehshir fault) built in Islamic period (~700-1250), shows any remarkable seismic activity until 750-1300 years ago. However, several evidence of geomorphologic markers such as drainages, gullies, streams and alluvial fans offsets, represent activity of the Dehshir fault in Late Quaternary. Of Geomorphic evidence at Marvast and Harabarjan sites record dextral - slip on the Dehshir fault during the Late Pleistocene-Holocene as major movement with minor dip - slip component. Rake of the fault movement has been considered for assessing to amount of horizontal and vertical slip rate on the Dehshir fault. This value in the North Marvast site has been calculated ~10 degrees and according to right bank offset on the Marvast river is ~7 degrees with horizontal and vertical displacements of 13 m and 1.5 m, respectively. Combining cumulative offset markers with OSL dating implies the Dehshir fault in Late Pleistocene-Holocene time period slips at horizontal and vertical components about 1±0.3 and 0.1 mm yr-1, respectively. We observed a minimum dextral offset along the Marvast fault segment in west of Harabarjan about 2 m that allow us assuming the related magnitude and date of last large paleoearthquake on the Dehshir fault is about Mw 7 and 2000 years ago, respectively.
M. Fattahi; S. Rostami Mehraban; M. Talebian; A. Bahroudi; J. Hollingsworth; R. Walker
Abstract
Neyshabour (approximately 200,000 pop.) lies on the southern margin of the Binalud mountains in NE Iran. The city has been destroyed four times by major historical earthquakes (in 1209, 1270, 1389 and 1405 A.D.).Three large faults occur in the region. The Binalud and North Neyshabur faults ...
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Neyshabour (approximately 200,000 pop.) lies on the southern margin of the Binalud mountains in NE Iran. The city has been destroyed four times by major historical earthquakes (in 1209, 1270, 1389 and 1405 A.D.).Three large faults occur in the region. The Binalud and North Neyshabur faults lie at the foot of the Binalud range north of Neyshabour. The Neyshabour fault lies within the valley west of Neyshabour. The Neyshabour fault, which lies 10 km south of the North Neyshabur fault, is 50 km long thrust. At each end of the Neyshabour fault two young, 10 km-long, thrust segments occur. It is close to Neyshabour city; and is a probable source of the 1209 and 1405 earthquakes. It poses a substantial seismic risk to the city because of the potential for future activity. Slip rate is one of the important parameters for seismic hazard assessment which was determined using SRTM for offset measurement and OSL for age calculation. Luminescence was measured through 7 mm Hoya U-340 filters in a Risø (Model TL/OSL-DA-15) automated TL/OSL system. The equivalent dose (De) was obtained using the conventional quartz single aliquot regeneration method (Murray and Wintle, 2000). Twelve aliquots have been processed for the sample, of which only the aliquots were accepted that satisfied the SAR restrictions. De was estimated using analyst program. Age was calculated using a weighted mean De for the sample. The Dose rate was obtained using uranium, thorium and potassium concentrations, which were measured by Micro Nomand portable gamma spectrometer in field. The results are presented in Table 1. Dividing the displacement by the minimum and the maximum ages provided the slip rate to be 0.1-0.2mm/yr.
M. Talebian; S. H. Tabatabaei; M. Fattahi; M. Ghorashi; A. Beitollahi; A. Ghalandarzadeh; M.A. Riahi
Abstract
The Iranian plateau lies between the Arabian and Eurasian plates and accommodates approximately 22 mm/yr of N-S shortening. About 9 mm/y of this shortening is taken up by folding and thrusting in the Zagros while the remaining 13 mm/yr is taken up in the Alborz and Kopeh-Dagh. The Central Iran ...
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The Iranian plateau lies between the Arabian and Eurasian plates and accommodates approximately 22 mm/yr of N-S shortening. About 9 mm/y of this shortening is taken up by folding and thrusting in the Zagros while the remaining 13 mm/yr is taken up in the Alborz and Kopeh-Dagh. The Central Iran block is relatively stable and thus moves to the north with an average velocity of about 13 mm/y. As the stable Afghanistan block lies to the east, the northward motion of Central Iran produces a right-lateral shear in eastern Iran, which is distributed mainly over a few major faults to the west (~5 mm/yr) and east (~ 8 mm/yr) of the Lut desert. Limited information is available about the slip rates of individual faults in eastern Iran; therefore in this study we try to combine all geological, geodetic and available Quaternary dating results to estimate the fault slip rates and distribution of active deformation in eastern Iran. Finally, we report the results from OSL dating of samples taken from uplifted plain deposits near the south end of the Bam-Baravat fault. These results show that this fault is growing in the vertical direction with at a rate of ~ 0.5 mmy-1. Considering geometric relation between the Bam-Baravat and the south Bam earthquake fault, we estimate a slip rate of about 2 mm/y for the south Bam earthquake fault.
