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3D thermal and rheological models of the southern Río de la Plata Craton (Argentina): implications for the initial stage of the Colorado rifting and the evolution of Sierras Australes

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Abstract

We present 3D thermal and rheological models of a key intra-plate locality of South America: the southernmost limit of the Río de la Plata Craton area (which encompasses the Claromecó Basin, the Sierras Australes, and the Colorado Basin). Both models were calculated on the basis of a previously published 3D lithospheric scale density model, after the population of the different units with thermal and rheological properties. Firstly, the steady-state conductive thermal field was modelled using different thermal properties in accordance with the assumed lithological composition of the units. Moving forward, the strength distribution was calculated considering the resulting thermal field and published rheological properties for common rock types as input for the different layers that compose the 3D density configuration of the area. Our main results suggest that the thickness and composition of the crust exert a first-order control on the present-day thermal field of the area and, subsequently, on the lithospheric strength. Particularly, we identified a rheologically weak lithospheric zone that coincides with previously proposed inherited Paleozoic structures of Gondwana. This inherited lithospheric fabric could have controlled the opening of the Colorado Rift Basin during the early Late Jurassic. In that sense, the present day high strength of the Rio Negro and Colorado transfer zones associated with the mafic infill of Colorado rifting in the Mesozoic suggests that the weak zones should have necessarily been developed during (at least) Paleozoic to early Mesozoic times. This supports the hypothesis that the reactivation and interaction of the latter with the Gondwanic weak lithospheric zone could have deformed and uplifted the Sierras Australes during the Gondwanides Orogeny.

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Acknowledgements

This research was funded by the Argentine Agency of Scientific and Technological Promotion (ANPCyT) PICT 2016-0709, the “Proyecto de Unidad Ejecutora” (PUE) and the University of Potsdam, Germany which had granted a fellowship during the 2018 winter semester, from October 1st to March 15th. This research could not have been achieved without the help of the section 4.5 Basin Modelling of the GFZ institute, particularly with the assistance of Maximilian Frick and Antoine Jacquey, in the 3D thermal modelling.

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  1. IGeBA CONICET-Universidad de Buenos Aires, Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales, Dpto de Cs. Geológcias, Buenos Aires, Argentina

    S. E. Vazquez Lucero, F. Ibarra, C. Prezzi & H. Vizán

  2. GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences-Helmholtz-Zentrum Potsdam, Potsdam, Germany

    M. L. Gomez Dacal, J. Bott & M. Scheck-Wenderoth

  3. RWTH Aachen, Faculty of Georesources and Materials Engineering, Aachen, Germany

    M. Scheck-Wenderoth

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  1. S. E. Vazquez Lucero
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Lucero, S.E.V., Ibarra, F., Dacal, M.L.G. et al. 3D thermal and rheological models of the southern Río de la Plata Craton (Argentina): implications for the initial stage of the Colorado rifting and the evolution of Sierras Australes. Int J Earth Sci (Geol Rundsch) 111, 1519–1538 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00531-022-02197-y

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