Coevolution of craton margins and interiors during continental break-up

Thomas M. Gernon (), Thea K. Hincks, Sascha Brune, Jean Braun, Stephen M. Jones, Derek Keir, Alice Cunningham and Anne Glerum
Additional contact information
Thomas M. Gernon: University of Southampton
Thea K. Hincks: University of Southampton
Sascha Brune: Helmholtz Centre Potsdam – GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences
Jean Braun: Helmholtz Centre Potsdam – GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences
Stephen M. Jones: University of Birmingham
Derek Keir: University of Southampton
Alice Cunningham: University of Southampton
Anne Glerum: Helmholtz Centre Potsdam – GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences

Nature, 2024, vol. 632, issue 8024, 327-335

Abstract: Abstract Many cratonic continental fragments dispersed during the rifting and break-up of Gondwana are bound by steep topographic landforms known as ‘great escarpments’1–4, which rim elevated plateaus in the craton interior5,6. In terms of formation, escarpments and plateaus are traditionally considered distinct owing to their spatial separation, occasionally spanning more than a thousand kilometres. Here we integrate geological observations, statistical analysis, geodynamic simulations and landscape-evolution models to develop a physical model that mechanistically links both phenomena to continental rifting. Escarpments primarily initiate at rift-border faults and slowly retreat at about 1 km Myr−1 through headward erosion. Simultaneously, rifting generates convective instabilities in the mantle7–10 that migrate cratonward at a faster rate of about 15–20 km Myr−1 along the lithospheric root, progressively removing cratonic keels11, driving isostatic uplift of craton interiors and forming a stable, elevated plateau. This process forces a synchronized wave of denudation, documented in thermochronology studies, which persists for tens of millions of years and migrates across the craton at a comparable or slower pace. We interpret the observed sequence of rifting, escarpment formation and exhumation of craton interiors as an evolving record of geodynamic mantle processes tied to continental break-up, upending the prevailing notion of cratons as geologically stable terrains.

Date: 2024
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-07717-1 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:nature:v:632:y:2024:i:8024:d:10.1038_s41586-024-07717-1

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/

DOI: 10.1038/s41586-024-07717-1

Access Statistics for this article

Nature is currently edited by Magdalena Skipper

More articles in Nature from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().