Journal
NATURE COMMUNICATIONS
Volume 12, Issue 1, Pages -Publisher
NATURE RESEARCH
DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-21760-w
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Funding
- GFZ expedition funds
- TIPTIMON and CATENA projects - German Ministry of Science and Education [03G0809A/B, 3G0878A/B]
- 'German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD)' at the University of Minnesota
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This study presents ongoing slab break-off and the crustal response during continental collision under the Hindu Kush region. By using finite-frequency tomography and earthquake data analysis, the researchers found that slab break-off is continuing in the Hindu Kush area of Afghanistan, with rapid orogenic evolution.
Break-off of part of the down-going plate during continental collision occurs due to tensile stresses built-up between the deep and shallow slab, for which buoyancy is increased because of continental-crust subduction. Break-off governs the subsequent orogenic evolution but real-time observations are rare as it happens over geologically short times. Here we present a finite-frequency tomography, based on jointly inverted local and remote earthquakes, for the Hindu Kush in Afghanistan, where slab break-off is ongoing. We interpret our results as crustal subduction on top of a northwards-subducting Indian lithospheric slab, whose penetration depth increases along-strike while thinning and steepening. This implies that break-off is propagating laterally and that the highest lithospheric stretching rates occur during the final pinching-off. In the Hindu Kush crust, earthquakes and geodetic data show a transition from focused to distributed deformation, which we relate to a variable degree of crust-mantle coupling presumably associated with break-off at depth. Here, the authors document active slab break-off and the crustal response during continental collision under the Hindu Kush, a rarely observed process since it happens over geologically short time spans.
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