Foreland and Hinterland basins: what controls their evolution?

Abstract

Compressional systems are usually characterized by a positive topography above the sea level, which is continuously modified by the conjugate effects of tectonic contraction or post-orogenic collapse, thermo-mechanical processes in the deep lithosphere and asthenosphere, but also by climate and other surface processes influencing erosion rates.

Different types of sedimentary basins can develop in close association with orogens, either in the foreland or in the hinterland. Being progressively filled by erosional products of adjacent uplifted domains, these basins provide a continuous sedimentary record of surficial, crustal and lithospheric deformation at and near plate boundaries.

Selected integrated basin-scale studies in the Circum-Mediterranean thrust belts and basins, in Pakistan and the Americas, are used here to document the effects of structures inherited from former orogens, rifts and passive margins, active tectonics and mantle dynamics on the development and long term evolution of synorogenic basins.