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Offshore Fault Geometrics in the Pearl River Estuary, Southeastern China: Evidence from Seismic Reflection Data

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Abstract

The Pearl River Estuary (PRE) is located at the onshore-offshore transition zone between South China and South China Sea Basin, and it is of great significant value in discussing tectonic relationships between South China block and South China Sea block and seismic activities along the offshore active faults in PRE. However, the researches on geometric characteristics of offshore faults in this area are extremely lacking. To investigate the offshore fault distribution and their geometric features in the PRE in greater detail, we acquired thirteen seismic reflection profiles in 2015. Combining the analysis of the seismic reflection and free-air gravity anomaly data, this paper revealed the location, continuity, and geometry of the littoral fault zone and other offshore faults in PRE. The littoral fault zone is composed of the major Dangan Islands fault and several parallel, high-angle, normal faults, which mainly trend northeast to northeast-to-east and dip to the southeast with large displacements. The fault zone is divided into three different segments by the northwest-trending faults. Moreover, the basement depth around Dangan Islands is very shallow, while it suddenly increases along the islands westward and southward. These has resulted in the islands and neighboring areas becoming the places where the stress accumulates easily. The seismogenic pattern of this area is closely related to the comprehensive effect of intersecting faults together with the low velocity layer.

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Acknowledgements

The field work of this study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 415060 46, 41376060, 41706054), the Opening Foundation of Key Laboratory of Ocean and Marginal Sea Geology, CAS (No. MSGL15-05) and WPOS (No. XDA11030102-02), and the Strategic Priority Research Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (No. XDA13010101). We would like to thank the crew of R/V Haidiao 6 and the science expedition team for collecting the data.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. CAS Key Laboratory of Ocean and Marginal Sea Geology, South China Sea Institute of Oceanology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou, 510301, China

    Jinghe Cao, Shaohong Xia, Jinlong Sun, Fang Zhao, Kuiyuan Wan & Huilong Xu

  2. University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100049, China

    Kuiyuan Wan

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  1. Jinghe Cao
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  2. Shaohong Xia
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  3. Jinlong Sun
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  4. Fang Zhao
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  5. Kuiyuan Wan
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  6. Huilong Xu
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Correspondence to Jinlong Sun.

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Cao, J., Xia, S., Sun, J. et al. Offshore Fault Geometrics in the Pearl River Estuary, Southeastern China: Evidence from Seismic Reflection Data. J. Ocean Univ. China 17, 799–810 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11802-018-3499-5

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