The tectonic structure of the Tyrrhenian Basin, a complex interaction among faulting and magmatism

Parte prima 86° Congresso della Società Geologica Italiana Note brevi e riassunti, Arcavacata di Rende, 18-20 Settembre 2012.-- 2 pages, 1 figureThe Tyrrhenian basin has formed in a subduction setting context, by extension of the overriding continental lithosphere in a process fundamentally driven by the retreat of a Ionian slab across the mantle. The lack of important normal-fault seismicity across the northern half of the basin seems to indicate that extension fully stopped there. The preserved basin structure provides information of the time evolution of the processes involved in rifting. The basin rifting rates and amount of extension changes from north to south, with rifting stopping after progressively larger stretching factor towards the south. The northern region stopped opening after a relatively low extension factor. Towards the south extension increased up to full crustal separation that produced mantle exhumation and locally collocated large-scale volcanism. The final structure displays two conjugate margins with asymmetric structures. Thus, the basin provides a natural laboratory to investigate a full rift system, that displays variable amounts of extensionPeer Reviewe