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Continental Margin of Western South America

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Book cover The Geology of Continental Margins

Abstract

The continental margin of the west coast of South America marks the seismically active, tectonic boundary between the converging Nasca and South American plates. The Peru-Chile Trench is the dominant morphologic element of the margin and persists as a structural feature from the coast of western Colombia to Tierra del Fuego, at the southern tip of South America. Variations in the trench morphology, sediment distribution, volcanism and orogenesis in the Andes, and the seismicity are interpeted to be the likely consequence of variations in the rate and direction of plate convergence and the effectiveness of geologic boundary conditions within the continental lithosphere. Some outstanding problems are cited also.

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Authors
  1. Dennis E. Hayes
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Mobil Oil Corporation, 221 Nassau Street, 08540, Princeton, New Jersey, USA

    Creighton A. Burk (Chief Geologist) (Chief Geologist)

  2. Department of Earth Sciences, Dartmouth College, 03755, Hanover, New Hampshire, USA

    Charles L. Drake (Professor of Earth Sciences) (Professor of Earth Sciences)

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© 1974 Springer Science+Business Media New York

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Hayes, D.E. (1974). Continental Margin of Western South America. In: Burk, C.A., Drake, C.L. (eds) The Geology of Continental Margins. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-01141-6_41

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-01141-6_41

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-662-01143-0

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-662-01141-6

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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