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Transform fault
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Diagram showing a transform fault with two plates moving in opposite directions
Transform fault (the red lines)
A transform fault or transform boundary is a plate boundary where the motion is predominantly horizontal.[1] It ends abruptly and is connected to another transform, a spreading ridge, or a subduction zone.[2]
Most of these faults are hidden in the deep ocean, where they offset divergent boundaries in short zigzags resulting from seafloor spreading, the best-known (and most destructive) being those on land at the margins of continental tectonic plates. A transform fault is the only type of strike-slip fault that is classified as a plate boundary.
Contents
[hide]
1 Nomenclature
2 Background
3 Difference between transform and transcurrent faults
4 Mechanics
5 Examples
6 Types
7 See also
8 References
Nomenclature[edit]
These faults are also known as conservative plate boundaries, since they neither create nor destroy lithosphere.
Background[edit]
Geophysicist and geologist John Tuzo Wilson recognized that the offsets of oceanic ridges by faults do not follow the classical pattern of an offset fence or geological marker in Reid’s rebound theory of faulting,[3] from which the sense of slip is derived. The new class of faults,[4] called transform faults, produce slip in the opposite direction from what one would surmise from the standard interpretation of an offset geological feature. Slip along transform faults does not increase the distance between the ridges it separates; the distance remains constant in earthquakes because the ridges are spreading centers. This hypothesis was confirmed in a study of the fault plane solutions that showed the slip on transform faults points in the opposite direction than classical interpretation would suggest.[5]
Difference between transform and transcurrent faults[edit]
Transform fault
Transcurrent fault
Transform faults are closely related to transcurrent faults and are commonly confused. Both types of fault are strike-slip or side-to-side in movement; nevertheless, transform faults end at the junction of another plate boundary or fault type, while transcurrent faults die out without a junction. In addition, transform faults have equal deformation across the entire fault line, while transcurrent faults have greater displacement in the middle of the fault zone and less on the margins. Finally, transform faults can form a tectonic plate boundary, while transcurrent faults cannot.
Mechanics[edit]
The effect of a fault is to relieve strain, which can be caused by compression, extension, or lateral stress in the rock layers at the surface or deep in the Earth’s subsurface. Transform faults specifically relieve strain by transporting the strain between ridges or subduction zones. They also act as the plane of weakness, which may result in splitting in rift zones.
Examples[edit]
Transform faults are commonly found linking segments of mid-oceanic ridges or spreading centres. These mid-oceanic ridges are where new seafloor is constantly created through the upwelling of new basaltic magma. With new seafloor being pushed and pulled out, the older seafloor slowly slides away from the mid-oceanic ridges toward the continents. Although separated only by tens of kilometers, this separation between segments of the ridges causes portions of the seafloor to push past each other in opposing directions. This lateral movement of seafloors past each other is where transform faults are currently active.
Spreading center and strips
Transform faults move differently from a strike-slip fault at the mid-oceanic ridge. Instead of the ridges moving away from each other, as they do in other strike-slip faults, transform-fault ridges remain in the same, fixed locations, and the new ocean seafloor created at the ridges is pushed away from the ridge. Evidence of this motion can be found in paleomagnetic striping on the seafloor.
A paper written by Gerya[who?] theorizes that the creation of the transform faults between the ridges of the mid-oceanic ridge is attributed to rotated and stretched sections of the mid-oceanic ridge.[6] This occurs over a long period of time with the spreading center or ridge slowly deforming from a straight line to a curved line. Finally, fracturing along these planes forms transform faults. As this takes place, the fault changes from a normal fault with extensional stress to a strike slip fault with lateral stress.[7] In the study done by Bonatti and Crane,[who?] peridotite and gabbro rocks were discovered in the edges of the transform ridges. These rocks are created deep inside the Earth’s mantle and then rapidly exhumed to the surface.[7] This evidence helps to prove that new seafloor is being created at the mid-oceanic ridges and further supports the theory of plate tectonics.
Active transform faults are between two tectonic structures or faults. Fracture zones represent the previously active transform-fault lines, which have since passed the active transform zone and are being pushed toward the continents. These elevated ridges on the ocean floor can be traced for hundreds of miles and in some cases even from one continent across an ocean to the other continent.
The most prominent examples of the mid-oceanic ridge transform zones are in the Atlantic Ocean between South America and Africa. Known as the St. Paul, Romanche, Chain, and Ascension fracture zones, these areas have deep, easily identifiable transform faults and ridges. Other locations include: the East Pacific Ridge located in the South Eastern Pacific Ocean, which meets up with San Andreas Fault to the North.
Transform faults are not limited to oceanic crust and spreading centers; many of them are on continental margins. The best example is the San Andreas Fault on the Pacific coast of the United States. The San Andreas Fault links the East Pacific Rise off the West coast of Mexico (Gulf of California) to the Mendocino Triple Junction (Part of the Juan de Fuca plate) off the coast of the Northwestern United States, making it a ridge-to-transform-style fault.[4] The formation of the San Andreas Fault system occurred fairly recently during the Oligocene Period between 34 million and 24 million years ago.[8] During this period, the Farallon plate, followed by the Pacific plate, collided into the North American plate.[8] The collision led to the subduction of the Farallon plate underneath the North American plate. Once the spreading center separating the Pacific and the Farallon plates was subducted beneath the North American plate, the San Andreas Continental Transform-Fault system was created.[8]
The Southern Alps rise dramatically beside the Alpine Fault on New Zealand's West Coast. About 500 kilometres (300 mi) long; northwest at top.
Other examples include:
Middle East's Dead Sea Transform fault
New Zealand's Alpine Fault
Pakistan's Chaman Fault
Turkey's North Anatolian Fault
North America's Queen Charlotte Fault
Types[edit]
In his work on transform-fault systems, geologist Tuzo Wilson said that transform faults must be connected to other faults or tectonic-plate boundaries on both ends; because of that requirement, transform faults can grow in length, keep a constant length, or decrease in length.[4] These length changes are dependent on which type of fault or tectonic structure connect with the transform fault. Wilson described six types of transform faults:
Growing length: In situations where a transform fault links a spreading center and the upper block of a subduction zone or where two upper blocks of subduction zones are linked, the transform fault itself will grow in length.[4]
Constant length: In other cases, transform faults will remain at a constant length. This steadiness can be attributed to many different causes. In the case of ridge-to-ridge transforms, the constancy is caused by the continuous growth by both ridges outward, canceling any change in length. The opposite occurs when a ridge linked to a subducting plate, where all the lithosphere (new sea floor) being created by the ridge is subducted, or swallowed up, by the subduction zone.[4] Finally, when two upper subduction plates are linked there is no change in length. This is due to the plates moving parallel with each other and no new lithosphere is being created to change that length.
Decreasing length faults: In rare cases, transform faults can shrink in length. These occur when two descending subduction plates are linked by a transform fault. In time as the plates are subducted, the transform fault will decrease in length until the transform fault disappears completely, leaving only two subduction zones facing in opposite directions.[4]
See also[edit]
Fracture zone
Leaky transform fault
List of tectonic plate interactions
Plate tectonics
Strike-slip tectonics
Structural geology
References[edit]
Jump up ^ Moores E.M.; Twiss R.J. (2014). Tectonics. Waveland Press. p. 130. ISBN 978-1-4786-2660-2.
Jump up ^ Kearey, K. A. (2007). Global Tectonics. Hoboken, NJ, USA: John Wiley & Sons. pp. 84–90.
Jump up ^ Reid, H.F., (1910). The Mechanics of the Earthquake. in The California Earthquake of April 18, 1906, Report of the State Earthquake Investigation Commission, Carnegie Institution of Washington, Washington D.C.
^ Jump up to: a b c d e f Wilson, J.T. (24 July 1965). "A new class of faults and their bearing on continental drift". Nature. 207 (4995): 343–347. Bibcode:1965Natur.207..343W. doi:10.1038/207343a0.
Jump up ^ Sykes, L.R. (1967). Mechanism of earthquakes and nature of faulting on the mid-oceanic ridges, Journal of Geophysical Research, 72, 5–27.
Jump up ^ Gerya, T. (2010). "Dynamical Instability Produces Transform Faults at Mid-Ocean Ridges". Science. 329 (5995): 1047–1050. Bibcode:2010Sci...329.1047G. doi:10.1126/science.1191349. PMID 20798313.
^ Jump up to: a b Bonatti, Enrico; Crane, Kathleen (1984). "Oceanic Fracture Zones". Scientific American. 5 (5): 40–52. doi:10.1038/scientificamerican0584-40.
^ Jump up to: a b c Atwater, Tanya (1970). "Implications of Plate Tectonics for the Cenozoic Tectonic Evolution of Western North America". Bulletin of the Geological Society of America. 81 (12): 3513–3536. doi:10.1130/0016-7606(1970)81[3513:ioptft]2.0.co;2.
International Tectonic Dictionary – AAPG Memoir 7, 1967
The Encyclopedia of Structural Geology and Plate Tectonics – Ed. by Carl K. Seyfert, 1987
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