Cenozoic tectonic events at the border of the Paraná Basin, São Paulo, Brazil

Abstract

In the last decade, even in areas that had been considered tectonically stable, a great amount of Cenozoic, including the Quaternary period, structural data have been collected throughout Brazil. The main goal of this study is to describe the Cenozoic structures and tectonic evolution of an area that is located at the border of the Paraná Basin in the state of São Paulo. The research methods consisted of the analysis of: (1) brittle structure data, mainly conjugate fractures and fault slip data; (2) lineaments traced on air photos and TM Landsat and radar images; and (3) a second-order base surface map. The study area, during the Cenozoic, has been affected by five strike–slip tectonic events, which generated mainly strike–slip faults, and secondarily normal and reverse ones. The events were named, from the oldest to the youngest, E1-NE, E2-EW, E3-NW, E4-NS, and E5-NNE; and the maximum principal stresses σ1 strike approximately NE–SW, E–W, NW–SE, N–S, and NNE–SSW, respectively. Event E2-EW seems to have been contemporaneous with the deposition of the Rio Claro Formation, the most important Cenozoic deposit of probable Neogenic age, and also to have controlled the distribution of its deposits. Event E3-NW was the strongest one in the area, as is pointed out by structural data, and the maximum principal stress σ1 of event E5-NNE is partially concordant with the orientation of σH-max of well break-out data in the Paraná Basin, suggesting a Neotectonic activity for this event. Finally, discontinuities parallel and correlated to the directions of strike–slip faults of the Cenozoic events seem to have actively controlled the sculpturing of the relief in the study area.