Microstructural evolution of pseudotachylyte-bearing rocks during increasing temperatures: Evidence from rock-heating experiments

Abstract

Pseudotachylyte are solidified melts that form from frictional heating on a fault plane during earthquakes and play an important role in the mechanism of faulting. Pseudotachylytes interact with mineralizing fluids and their textures are altered over long periods of time; consequently, determining seismic parameters by characterizing pseudotachylytes in the field remains challenging. In this study, we performed heating experiments on faulted pseudotachylyte-bearing cataclasites recovered from the Wenchuan Earthquake Fault Scientific Drilling Project-2 (WFSD-2) to constrain the formation of temperatures and microstructural evolution of the pseudotachylytes. These experiments revealed that melting occurred at 1100 °C, while microlites formed at 1100 °C and disappeared at 1500 °C, and metallic iron spherulites formed at 1300 °C. Fractures and cracks occurred in the pseudotachylytes after rapid cooling, implying an increase in pore volume that allowed for fluid infiltration and subsequent alteration. Because natural pseudotachylyte of the WFSD-2 shows the lack of microlite and the presence of metallic iron spherulites, our results imply that its formation was at temperature of 1300–1500 °C under water-deficient conditions.