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Structural Geology Haakon Fossen PDF: Des régimes tectoniques contractionnels, extensionnels, décroc



Fault imaging is the process in which faults are processed, identified, and visualized in various ways while conducting seismic exploration. There are multiple motivations for seismically imaging faults. Generally, the goal is to better understand the structural geology of an area, which can range in scale from basin to small-scale reservoir modeling of single formations.


The objective of this short paper was to provide some advice on how to write a geoscience paper of international standard and to warn against some common pitfalls. It is focused on how to structure a paper and stresses the importance of building its contents around a well-defined problem. Furthermore, the importance of moving away from outdated and counterproductive ways of describing and interpreting deformation is emphasized. In particular, describing structures and tectonic evolution in a poorly founded scheme of multiple deformation phases and making stress interpretations from structurally complex and heterogeneous rocks where rotations and stress perturbations are difficult or impossible to account for are strongly discouraged. Instead, I encourage the use of modern structural geology and tectonics ideas that, among other things, allow for composite and overprinting structures to form progressively and diachronously with a wide variation in style and orientation during a single deformation history. Also, more emphasis should be put on strain and kinematics, toning down the use of stress. After all, stress is only observed through strain and kinematics; going from one to the other is not straightforward in general, and particularly difficult in ductilely deformed rocks.




structural geology haakon fossen pdf




Writing a scientific geoscience paper that meets the standards of an international journal can be challenging, particularly when structural geology and tectonics are involved. It requires good knowledge of the scientific method, a solid and reproducible database to build the work on, deep insights into the relevant field(s) of science, a good overview of relevant published work and existing models, good communications skills, good language skills, critical and constructive advisors and reviewers, and a good portion of time and patience. This short paper provides some views and advices based on experience from the Brazilian Journal of Geology and papers from other journals dealing with Brazilian structural geology and tectonics.


This document is not a complete guide to writing an academic geoscience paper, but rather deals with specific issues that reappear in manuscripts submitted to BJG. Most of its contents also apply to Master and PhD theses, many of which form the basis for future international publications. General advice on academic paper writing can be found elsewhere (e.g., Mack 2018Mack C.A. 2018. How to write a good scientific paper. Washington, Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE), 108 p.), and the editorial by Eriksson et al. (2005Eriksson P., Altermann W., Catuneanu O. 2005. Some general advice for writing a scientific paper. Journal of African Earth Sciences, 41:285-288. ) is recommended as a guide for how to write and structure a geoscience paper. The present contribution has a generally applicable first part, and then focuses more specifically on structural geology and tectonics. It has been written to benefit future authors, particularly younger researchers with limited international publication experience but with ambitions to present Brazilian geology where it belongs: at a high international level.


Reading papers on Brazilian geology, including the paper mentioned above (Peixoto et al. 2018Peixoto E., Alkmim F.F., Pedrosa-Soares A.C. 2018. The Rio Pardo salient, northern Araçuaí orogen: an example of a complex basin-controlled fold-thrust belt curve. Brazilian Journal of Geology, 48(1):25-49. -4889201820170134 -488920182... ), one can easily get the impression that there are more phases of deformation in Brazil than elsewhere. This is of course not the case, but relates to the excessive and old-fashioned use of the concept of deformation phases in Brazil. Deformation phases certainly exist, and in some cases it is both possible and useful to distinguish between different phases of deformation based on a combination of several independent criteria, such as structural overprinting, stratigraphic evidence, metamorphic and microtextural characteristics, P-T estimates, and geochronologic evidence.


One may wonder what to focus on if the common counting of deformation phases and stress interpretations are to be toned down or omitted. An important part of the answer is to break loose from the traditional descriptive structural geology and tectonic models that have been inherited and repeated in the geoscience community in Brazil for quite some time. For any science to advance it is necessary to think new and test out alternative models. Hence, we all should appreciate and encourage such attempts. A prerequisite for making progress in structural geology and tectonics is, naturally, to thoroughly understand modern theory and methods, with their possibilities and limitations. Counting deformation phases is easy and requires little insight into modern structural geology, and it adds little or negatively to the advance of geologic knowledge. This does not mean that field-based structural analysis and fabric descriptions are outdated, far from it. It just means that field-based observations must be unleashed from predefined schemes to become more objective, and then analyzed and interpreted in the context of modern structural geology and tectonics. Furthermore, integrating finite strain, fabric development, kinematics, vorticity analysis, and incremental strain data, and combining this type of structural data with geochronologic information, geophysical data and perhaps also physical or numerical modeling is recommended. In particular, strategic dating of minerals, dikes or other elements that can constrain the structural evolution in time is invaluable.


Further, methodology now exists that takes structural geology down to the microscale in a new way. The Electron Backscatter Diffraction (EBSD) is such a technique, now available in some Brazilian universities. This tool should be carefully combined with other structural analysis to explore crustal deformation at macroscale. Also, combining such information with various pressure-temperature data is useful. Magnetic fabrics (Anisotropy of Magnetic Susceptibility) is yet another method that can reveal fabric patterns in rocks, such as magmatic-state as well as solid-state deformation that would otherwise be difficult to extract by classical field methods. 2ff7e9595c


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