The Southern Urals. Decoupled evolution of the thrust belt and its foreland: a consequence of metamorphism and lithospheric weakening

Abstract

An analysis is presented of the mechanisms of tectonic evolution of the southern part of the Urals between 48N and 60N in the Carboniferous–Triassic. A low tectonic activity was typical of the area in the Early Carboniferous — after closure of the Uralian ocean in the Late Devonian. A nappe, ≥10–15 km thick, overrode a shallow-water shelf on the margin of the East European platform in the early Late Carboniferous. It is commonly supposed that strong shortening and thickening of continental crust result in mountain building. However, no high mountains were formed, and the nappe surface reached the altitude of only ≤0.5 km. No high topography was formed after another collisional events at the end of the Late Carboniferous, in the second half of the Early Permian, and at the start of the Middle Triassic. A low magnitude of the crustal uplift in the regions of collision indicates a synchronous density increase from rapid metamorphism in mafic rocks in the lower crust. This required infiltration of volatiles from the asthenosphere as a catalyst. A layer of dense mafic rocks, ∼20 km thick, still exists at the base of the Uralian crust. It maintains the crust, up to ∼60 km thick, at a mean altitude ∼0.5 km. The mountains, ∼1.5 km high, were formed in the Late Permian and Early Triassic when there was no collision. Their moderate height precluded asthenospheric upwelling to the base of the crust, which at that time was ∼65–70 km thick. The mountains could be formed due to delamination of the lower part of mantle root with blocks of dense eclogite and/or retrogression in a presence of fluids of eclogites in the lower crust into less dense facies. The formation of foreland basins is commonly attributed to deflection of the elastic lithosphere under surface and subsurface loads in thrust belts. Most of tectonic subsidence on the Uralian foreland occurred in a form of short impulses, a few million years long each. They took place at the beginning and at the end of the Late Carboniferous, and in the Late Permian. Rapid crustal subsidence occurred when there was no collision in the Urals. Furthermore, the basin deepened away from thrust belt. These features preclude deflection of the elastic lithosphere as a subsidence mechanism. To ensure the subsidence, a rapid density increase was necessary. It took place due to metamorphism in the lower crust under infiltration of volatiles. The absence of flexural reaction on the Uralian foreland on collision in thrust belt together with narrow-wavelength basement deformations under the nappe indicate a high degree of weakening of the lithosphere. Such deformations took also place on the Uralian foreland at the epochs of rapid subsidences when there was no collision in thrust belt. Weakening of the lithosphere can be explained by infiltration of volatiles into this layer from the asthenosphere and rapid metamorphism in the mafic lower crust. Lithospheric weakening allowed the formation of the Uralian thrust belt under convergent motions of the plates which were separated by weak areas.