Paleo-Stress History and Basin Evolution: Tertiary Central Basin of Spitsbergen

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Plate reconstructions and earlier regional geologic, mapping have lead to the concept that the Tertiary deformation of Spitsbergen's western margin was a consequence of transcurrent motion during the opening of the Norwegian-Greenland Sea. This investigation will test the hypothesis that the Paleocene-Eocene subsidence of the Central Basin in Nordenskioldland is a direct result of strike-slip tectonics, a result so far only inferred from sedimentological data, and not yet corroborated by structural evidence. This investigation will include detailed measurement of micro- and meso-scale geologic structures in Cretaceous and Paleocene units in western Nordenskioldland. Using innovative microstructure-analysis techniques which incorporate iterative numerical computer modelling, the orientations, relative timing, and the relative magnitudes of the principal axes of the paleostress will be determined thus documenting paleo-stress fields coeval with the formation of the Central Basin.