A Tectonic Reconstruction Of Accreted Terranes Along The Paleo-Pacific Margin Of Gondwana

Abstract

The southern oceanic margin of Gondwana was nearly 40,000 km long or 24,854.8 miles. The southern margin was the result of the Terra Australis orogen. Spanning 18,000 km or 11,184.7 miles and is proposed as one of the largest and longest lived orogens in Earth history. The paleo-Pacific margin of Gondwana consisted of segments of the Australian-Antarctic craton, southern South America (modern Argentina and Chile), southern South Africa, Marie Byrdland, New Zealand and its adjacent continental shelf, the Ellsworth Mountains, and the Transantarctic Mountains. The process of terrane accretion has played a substantial part in the assembly of the continents as they look today. The paleo-Pacific margin of Gondwana was an active region of terrane accretion from the Neoproterozoic to the Late Mesozoic.This research study examines the accretion of terranes across the paleo-Pacific Gondwana margin to provide a comprehensive reconstruction. A paleogeographic basemap was created using PALEOMAP Project maps and the geology data was provided by the School of Geoscience from the University of Witwatersrand of South Africa. Location and data analyzed for terranes were collected building a PDF library of journal articles across numerous geological publications.