Regional variations in the crustal structure of Northern Canada from surface wave dispersion

Abstract

Rayleigh and Love wave group velocities in the Arctic islands and adjacent mainland of northern Canada exhibit large regional variations which can be attributed to variations in crustal structure. The shield and platform regions, the eastern Sverdrup basin, and the western Sverdrup basin are characterized by progressively slower velocities. Inversions of the regionalized group velocity data lead to three distinct shear-velocity models. The shield and platform model is similar to earlier models obtained for the Canadian shield. The Sverdrup basin models have low near-surface velocities which may correspond to thick accumulations of sediment. A sediment thickness of about 12 km obtained for the eastern basin corresponds to the maximum thickness inferred from earlier geological studies. An even thicker zone of low velocities occurs in the upper crust of the western basin. This zone may represent the true thickness of a very deep basin or slow velocities in basement rock may underlie the shallower sediments. A third alternative is that low apparent velocities for the western Sverdrup basin result from systematic errors in group velocity determinations produced by epicentral mislocations or origin time errors of the earthquakes used, but such mislocation or errors would have to be quite large to explain the observations. It is not possible to explain the group velocities across the basin areas by simply adding sediments to the shield and platform model. The resulting discrepancies with the data suggest an altogether different crustal structure beneath the basin than that beneath the shield and platform areas.