TY - JOUR A1 - Parra, Mauricio A1 - Mora, Andrés A1 - Sobel, Edward A1 - Strecker, Manfred A1 - González, Román T1 - Episodic orogenic front migration in the northern Andes : constraints from low-temperature thermochronology in the Eastern Cordillera, Colombia N2 - New thermochronometric data from the Eastern Cordillera of the Colombian Andes reveal diachronous exhumation associated with Cenozoic contractional deformation in this sector of the northern Andes. We present a comprehensive account of exhumation patterns along a 150-km-long, across-strike transect between similar to 4 degrees and 6 degrees N by integrating 29 new apatite fission track (AFT) ages and 17 new zircon fission track (ZFT) ages with sparse published thermochronological data from this area. Our data reveal episodic eastward migration of the orogenic front at an average rate of 2.5-2.7 mm/a during the Late Cretaceous-Cenozoic. We identify three major stages of orogen propagation: (1) slow propagation (0.5-3.1 mm/a) until early Eocene; (2) rapid orogenic advance (4.0-18.0 mm/a) during middle-late Eocene, which accounts for similar to 86% of the orogen's present width; and (3) slow orogen propagation (1.2-2.1 mm/a) from Oligocene to Holocene times. Our data demonstrate that in the course of changes in plate kinematics, the presence of inherited crustal anisotropies, such as the former rift-bounding faults of the Eastern Cordillera, favor a nonsystematic progression of foreland basin deformation through time by preferentially concentrating accommodation of slip and thrust loading along these zones of weakness. Y1 - 2009 UR - http://www.agu.org/journals/tc/ U6 - https://doi.org/10.1029/2008tc002423 SN - 0278-7407 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Parra, Mauricio A1 - Mora, Andrés A1 - Jaramillo, Carlos A1 - Strecker, Manfred A1 - Sobel, Edward A1 - Quiroz, Luis A1 - Rueda, Milton A1 - Torres, Vladimir T1 - Orogenic wedge advance in the northern Andes : evidence from the Oligocene-Miocene sedimentary record of the Medina Basin, Eastern Cordillera, Colombia N2 - Foreland basin development in the Andes of central Colombia has been suggested to have started in the Late Cretaceous through tectonic loading of the Central Cordillera. Eastward migration of the Cenozoic orogenic front has also been inferred from the foreland basin record west of the Eastern Cordillera. However, farther east, limited data provided by foreland basin strata and the adjacent Eastern Cordillera complicate any correlation among mountain building, exhumation, and foreland basin sedimentation. In this study, we present new data from the Medina Basin in the eastern foothills of the Eastern Cordillera of Colombia. We report sedimentological data and palynological ages that link an eastward-thinning early Oligocene to early Miocene syntectonic wedge containing rapid facies changes with an episode of fast tectonic subsidence starting at ca. 31 Ma. This record may represent the first evidence of topographic loading generated by slip along the principal basement-bounding thrusts in the Eastern Cordillera to the southwest of the basin. Zircon fission-track ages and paleo-current analysis reveal the location of these thrust loads and illustrate a time lag between the sedimentary signal of topographic loading and the timing of exhumation (ca. 18 Ma). This lag may reflect the period between the onset of range uplift and significant removal of overburden. Vitrinite reflectance data document northward along-strike propagation of the deformation front and folding of the Oligocene syntectonic wedge. This deformation was coupled with a nonuniform incorporation of the basin into the wedge-top depozone. Thus, our data set constitutes unique evidence for the early growth and propagation of the deformation front in the Eastern Cordillera, which may also improve our understanding of spatiotemporal patterns of foreland evolution in other mountain belts. Y1 - 2009 UR - http://gsabulletin.gsapubs.org/ U6 - https://doi.org/10.1130/B26257.1 SN - 0016-7606 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Mora, Andrés A1 - Parra, Mauricio A1 - Strecker, Manfred A1 - Kammer, Andreas A1 - Dimate, Cristina A1 - Rodriguez, Fernando T1 - Cenozoic contractional reactivation of Mesozoic extensional structures in the Eastern Cordillera of Colombia N2 - [ 1] The Eastern Cordillera of Colombia is key to understanding the role of inherited basement anisotropies in the evolution of active noncollisional mountain belts. In particular, the Rio Blanco-Guatiquia region of the Eastern Cordillera is exemplary in displaying a variety of phenomena that document the importance of the orientation, geometry, and segmentation of preorogenic anisotropies. We document the first unambiguous evidence that extensional basement structures played an important role in determining the locus of deformation during contractional reactivation in the Eastern Cordillera. Detailed structural field mapping and analysis of industry seismic reflection profiles have helped to identify the inherited San Juanito, Naranjal, and Servita normal faults and associated transfer faults as important structures that were inverted during the Cenozoic Andean orogeny. Apparently, the more internal faults in the former rift basin were not properly oriented for an efficient reactivation in contraction. However, these faults have a fundamental role as strain risers, as folding is concentrated west of them. In contrast, reactivated normal faults such as the more external Servita fault are responsible for uplifting the eastern flank of the Eastern Cordillera. In addition, these structures are adjacent and intimately linked to the development of thin-skinned faults farther east. In part, the superimposed compression in this prestrained extensional region is compensated by lateral escape. The dominant presence of basement involved buckling and thrusting, and the restricted development of thin-skinned thrusting in this inversion orogen makes the Eastern Cordillera a close analog to the intraplate Atlas Mountains of Morocco and other inverted sectors of the Andean orogen farther south Y1 - 2006 UR - http://www.agu.org/journals/tc/ U6 - https://doi.org/10.1029/2005tc001854 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Mora, Andrés A1 - Gaona, Tatiana A1 - Kley, Jonas A1 - Montoya, Diana A1 - Parra, Mauricio A1 - Quiroz, Luis Ignacio A1 - Reyes, German A1 - Strecker, Manfred T1 - The role of inherited extensional fault segmentation and linkage in contractional orogenesis : a reconstruction of Lower Cretaceous inverted rift basins in the Eastern Cordillera of Colombia N2 - Lower Cretaceous early syn-rift facies along the eastern flank of the Eastern Cordillera of Colombia, their provenance, and structural context, reveal the complex interactions between Cretaceous extension, spatio-temporal trends in associated sedimentation, and subsequent inversion of the Cretaceous Guatiquia paleo-rift. South of 4 degrees 30'N lat, early syn-rift alluvial sequences in former extensional footwall areas were contemporaneous with fan- delta deposits in shallow marine environments in adjacent hanging-wall areas. In general, footwall erosion was more pronounced in the southern part of the paleorift. In contrast, early syn-rift sequences in former footwall areas in the northern rift sectors mainly comprise shallow marine supratidal sabkha to intertidal strata, whereas hanging-wall units display rapid transitions to open-sea shales. In comparison with the southern paleo-rift sector, fan-delta deposits in the north are scarce, and provenance suggests negligible footwall erosion. The southern graben segment had longer, and less numerous normal faults, whereas the northern graben segment was characterized by shorter, rectilinear faults. To the east, the graben system was bounded by major basin-margin faults with protracted activity and greater throw as compared with intrabasinal faults to the west. Intrabasinal structures grew through segment linkage and probably interacted kinematically with basin-margin faults. Basin-margin faults constitute a coherent fault system that was conditioned by pre-existing basement fabrics. Structural mapping, analysis of present-day topography, and balanced cross sections indicate that positive inversion of extensional structures was focused along basin-bounding faults, whereas intrabasinal faults remained unaffected and were passively transported by motion along the basin-bounding faults. Thus, zones of maximum subsidence in extension accommodated maximum elevation in contraction, and former topographic highs remained as elevated areas. This documents the role of basin-bounding faults as multiphased, long-lived features conditioned by basement discontinuities. Inversion of basin-bounding faults was more efficient in the southern than in the northern graben segment, possibly documenting the inheritance and pivotal role of fault-displacement gradients. Our observations highlight similarities between inversion features in orogenic belts and intra-plate basins, emphasizing the importance of the observed phenomena as predictive tools in the spatiotemporal analysis of inversion histories in orogens, as well as in hydrocarbon and mineral deposits exploration. Y1 - 2009 UR - http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/issn?DESCRIPTOR=PRINTISSN&VALUE=0950-091X U6 - https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2117.2008.00367.x SN - 0950-091X ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Leon, Santiago A1 - Cardona, Agustin A1 - Parra, Mauricio A1 - Sobel, Edward A1 - Jaramillo, Juan S. A1 - Glodny, Johannes A1 - Valencia, Victor A. A1 - Chew, David A1 - Montes, Camilo A1 - Posada, Gustavo A1 - Monsalve, Gaspar A1 - Pardo-Trujillo, Andres T1 - Transition from collisional to subduction-related regimes BT - an example from neogene Panama-Nazca-South america interactions JF - Tectonics N2 - A geological transect across the suture separating northwestern South America from the Panama Arc helps document the provenance and thermal history of both crustal domains and the suture zone. During middle Miocene, strata were being accumulated over the suture zone between the Panama Arc and the continental margin. Integrated provenance analyses of those middle Miocene strata show the presence of mixed sources that includes material derived from the two major crustal domains: the old northwestern South American orogens and the younger Panama Arc. Coeval moderately rapid exhumation of Upper Cretaceous to Paleogene sediments forming the reference continental margin is suggested from our inverse thermal modeling. Strata within the suture zone are intruded by similar to 12 Ma magmatic arc-related plutons, marking the transition from a collisional orogen to a subduction-related one. Renewed late Miocene to Pliocene acceleration of the exhumation rates is the consequence of a second tectonic pulse, which is likely to be triggered by the onset of a flat-slab subduction of the Nazca plate underneath the northernmost Andes of Colombia, suggesting that late Miocene to Pliocene orogeny in the Northern Andes is controlled by at least two different tectonic mechanisms. Y1 - 2017 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1002/2017TC004785 SN - 0278-7407 SN - 1944-9194 VL - 37 IS - 1 SP - 119 EP - 139 PB - American Geophysical Union CY - Washington ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Gomez, Andreas A. A1 - Jaramillo, Carlos A. A1 - Parra, Mauricio A1 - Mora, Andres T1 - Huesser Horizon : a lake and a marine incursion in northwestern South America during the early Miocene N2 - The Cenozoic stratigraphic sequence in the foothills of the Eastern Cordillera of Colombia is mostly fluvial in nature and very thick (similar to 8000 m), but it contains very few mollusk-bearing horizons. Recent fieldwork discovered a well-preserved molluscan assemblage that occurs near the top of the Carbonera Formation (lower Miocene) in the central foothills of the Eastern Cordillera. This level, named the Huesser horizon, is laterally extensive and can be followed for tens of kilometers. The horizon is 10 m thick and was divided into eight levels, five of them highly fossiliferous. Most of the levels are dominated by the freshwater gastropod Sheppardiconcha, with lower abundances of the bivalves Anodondiles and Mytilopsis. The top level is dominated by specimens from the bivalve family Arcidae. The taxonomic composition of the assemblage is similar to that of the Magdalena and Amazonas Basins during the early-to- middle Miocene. Paleoecologic, taphonomic, and palynological analyses indicate that the Huesser accumulated in a freshwater lake system, capped by a marine incursion. The development of a large lake and the subsequent marine event could be related to increasing subsidence coincident with eustatic sea-level rise that has been identified for the basin during the early Miocene. Y1 - 2009 UR - http://palaios.geoscienceworld.org/ U6 - https://doi.org/10.2110/palo.2007.p07-074r SN - 0883-1351 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Bande, Alejandro A1 - Horton, Brian K. A1 - Ramirez, Juan C. A1 - Mora, Andres A1 - Parra, Mauricio A1 - Stockli, Daniel F. T1 - Clastic deposition, provenance, and sequence of Andean thrusting in the frontal Eastern Cordillera and Llanos foreland basin of Colombia JF - Geological Society of America bulletin N2 - Sedimentological, provenance, and detrital thermochronological results for basin fill at the modern deformation front of the northern Andes (6 degrees N latitude) provide a long-term, Eocene to Pliocene record of foreland-basin sedimentation along the Eastern Cordillera !Janos basin boundary in Colombia. Lithofacies assemblages and paleocurrent orientations in the upward-coarsening, 5-km-thick succession of the Nunchia syncline reveal a systematic shift from craton-derived, shallow-marine distal foreland (back-bulge) accumulation in the Mirador Formation, to orogen-sourced, deltaic, and coastalinfluenced sedimentation of the distal to medial foreland (foredeep) in the Carbonera and Leon Formations, to anastomosing fluvial and distributive braided fluvial megafan systems of the proximal foreland (foredeep to wedge-top) basin in the lower and upper Guayabo Formation. These changes in depositional processes and sediment dispersal are supported by up-section variations in detrital zircon U-Pb and (U-Th)/He ages that record exhumation of evolving, compartmentalized sediment source areas in the Eastern Cordillera. The data are interpreted in terms of a progressive eastward advance in foldand-thrust deformation, with late Eocene Oligocene deformation in the axial zone of the Eastern Cordillera along the western edge of Floresta basin (Soapaga thrust), early Miocene reactivation (inversion) of the eastern margin of the Mesozoic rift system (Pajarito and Guaicaramo thrusts), and middle late Miocene propagation of a footwall shortcut fault (Vopal thrust) that created the Nunchia syncline in a wedge-top (piggyback) setting of the eastern foothills along the transition from the Eastern Cordillera to Harms foreland basin. Collectively, the data presented here for the frontal Eastern Cordillera define a general in-sequence pattern of eastwardadvancing fold-and-thrust deformation during Cenozoic east-west shortening in the Colombian Andes. Y1 - 2012 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1130/B30412.1 SN - 0016-7606 VL - 124 IS - 1-2 SP - 59 EP - 76 PB - American Institute of Physics CY - Boulder ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Ballato, Paolo A1 - Parra, Mauricio A1 - Schildgen, Taylor F. A1 - Dunkl, I. A1 - Yildirim, C. A1 - Özsayin, Erman A1 - Sobel, Edward A1 - Echtler, H. A1 - Strecker, Manfred T1 - Multiple exhumation phases in the Central Pontides (N Turkey) BT - new temporal constraints on Major geodynamic changes associated with the closure of the Neo-Tethys Ocean JF - Tectonics N2 - The Central Pontides of N Turkey represents a mobile orogenic belt of the southern Eurasian margin that experienced several phases of exhumation associated with the consumption of different branches of the Neo-Tethys Ocean and the amalgamation of continental domains. Our new low-temperature thermochronology data help to constrain the timing of these episodes, providing new insights into associated geodynamic processes. In particular, our data suggest that exhumation occurred at (1) similar to 110 to 90Ma, most likely during tectonic accretion and exhumation of metamorphic rocks from the subduction zone; (2) from similar to 60 to 40Ma, during the collision of the Kirehir and Anatolide-Tauride microcontinental domains with the Eurasian margin; (3) from similar to 0 to 25Ma, either during the early stages of the Arabia-Eurasia collision (soft collision) when the Arabian passive margin reached the trench, implying 70 to 530km of subduction of the Arabian passive margin, or during a phase of trench advance predating hard collision at similar to 20Ma; and (4) similar to 11Ma to the present, during transpression associated with the westward motion of Anatolia. Our findings document the punctuated nature of fault-related exhumation, with episodes of fast cooling followed by periods of slow cooling or subsidence, the role of inverted normal faults in controlling the Paleogene exhumation pattern, and of the North Anatolian Fault in dictating the most recent pattern of exhumation. KW - thermal modeling KW - Central Pontides KW - Arabia-Eurasia collision KW - trench advance KW - Anatolia westward motion KW - inversion tectonics Y1 - 2018 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1029/2017TC004808 SN - 0278-7407 SN - 1944-9194 VL - 37 IS - 6 SP - 1831 EP - 1857 PB - American Geophysical Union CY - Washington ER -