@article{EndrunLebedevMeieretal.2011,
  author    = {Endrun, Brigitte and Lebedev, Sergei and Meier, Thomas and Tirel, Celine and Friederich, Wolfgang},
  title     = {Complex layered deformation within the Aegean crust and mantle revealed by seismic anisotropy},
  series = {Nature geoscience},
  volume    = {4},
  journal   = {Nature geoscience},
  number    = {3},
  publisher = {Nature Publ. Group},
  address   = {New York},
  issn      = {1752-0894},
  doi       = {10.1038/NGEO1065},
  pages     = {203 -- 207},
  year      = {2011},
  abstract  = {Continental lithosphere can undergo pervasive internal deformation, often distributed over broad zones near plate boundaries. However, because of the paucity of observational constraints on three-dimensional movement at depth, patterns of flow within the lithosphere remain uncertain. Endmember models for lithospheric flow invoke deformation localized on faults or deep shear zones or, alternatively, diffuse, viscous-fluid-like flow. Here we determine seismic Rayleigh-wave anisotropy in the crust and mantle of the Aegean region, an archetypal example of continental deformation. Our data reveal a complex, depth-dependent flow pattern within the extending lithosphere. Beneath the northern Aegean Sea, fast shear wave propagation is in a North-South direction within the mantle lithosphere, parallel to the extensional component of the current strain rate field. In the south-central Aegean, where deformation is weak at present, anisotropic fabric in the lower crust runs parallel to the direction of palaeo-extension in the Miocene. The close match of orientations of regional-scale anisotropic fabric and the directions of extension during the last significant episodes of deformation implies that at least a large part of the extension in the Aegean has been taken up by distributed viscous flow in the lower crust and lithospheric mantle.},
  language  = {en}
}