Punctuated Neogene tectonics and stratigraphy of theAfrican-Iberian plate-boundary zone: concurrent developmentof Betic-Rif basins (southern Spain, northern Morocco)

摘要

This paper integrates the sequence stratigraphic and tectonic data related to the Neogene geodynamic and palaeogeographic development of theAfrican-Iberian plate boundary zone between Spain and Morocco. Though the dating of individual tectonostratigraphic sequences and theirdelimiting sequence boundaries varies in accuracy and precision, their apparent correlation strongly suggests contemporaneous development ofthe Betic and Rif basins. This may likely be attributed to regional changes of the overall compressional intra-plate stress field. This, in turn, wasgoverned by coeval plate-kinematic changes related to the ongoing collisional convergence of Africa and Iberia. The Neogene succession ischaracterised by brief tectonic pulses that governed the sequence stratigraphic development of the Betic-Rif basins (NBR phases). It broadlycorrelates with the coeval sequences in the compressional foreland basins and extensional rift basins in front of the collisional Alpine andPyrenean orogens (CRF phases). These regionally correlatable basinal deformation events indicate that stress-related episodic changes at theAfrican-Iberian plate-boundary zone resulted in an essentially direct cause-and-effect relationship between the tectonostratigraphic evolutionof Neogene basins in northern African (Morocco), southern Europe (Spain) and western Europe (France, Switzerland, Germany).