Strain histories from the eastern Central Range of Taiwan: A record of advection through a collisional orogen

Abstract

In the eastern Central Range of Taiwan there is a regional variation in the orientation of maximum finite stretch across the slate belt, with down-dip maximum stretch found in the western Central Range and along-strike maximum stretch in the eastern Central Range. Incremental strain histories from syntectonic fibers in pyrite pressure shadows indicate a progressive change in extension direction from down dip to along strike during deformation, there is a corresponding temporal variation in stretching direction shown in samples from the eastern edge of the Central Range, a pattern that mimics the regional west-to-east spatial variation. These observed temporal and spatial strain distributions are used to evaluate the kinematics associated with slaty cleavage development during advection through the Taiwan orogenic system. The subduction zone beneath the island of Taiwan is influenced by two types of obliquity that have the potential to generate the observed along-strike stretching. First, the plate motion vector of the Philippine Sea plate relative to the Eurasian plate is slightly oblique to the regional strike of the mountain range, which could result in partitioning of strike slip shearing into the interior of the collision. Second, the north-south Luzon volcanic arc on the Philippine Sea Plate is obliquely oriented relative to the northeast-southwest edge of the Eurasian continental margin, which could result in lateral extrusion of the ductile core of the range. Incremental strain histories in cleavage-parallel samples represent a time-for-space equivalence where the stretching direction is fixed relative to the position within the mountain belt architecture (e.g., the topographic divide), and temporal variations in the eastern central Range reflect lateral advection through the strain field in response to accretionary and erosional fluxes. Incremental strain histories in cleavage perpendicular samples show both clockwise and counter-clockwise rotation of strain, indicating the possibility of bulk coaxial strain and lateral extrusion.