Plate Boundary Geodynamics - The New Zealand Observatory: A Workshop Proposal

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0530977FurlongThis Planning Workshop is focused on a transpressional plate boundary with the goals of: 1) examining why transpression results in contrasting styles of plate-boundary deformation (subduction versus transform faulting) in adjacent segments of the plate boundary; and 2) delineating the nature of the transition between these two regions. The proposed study area, the Fiordland - Southern Alps region of New Zealand, appears to provide an outstanding example of contrasting transpressional behavior, as well as being a region where a large amount of related studies (with substantial NSF - EAR funding) have already been completed or are underway. However, most of the projects in NZ have focused on local segments of the plate boundary, aiming at testing specific processes or tectonic models applicable to that segment. With the exception of one well known review paper (Walcott - 1998) there are essentially no attempts to link together our understanding of the plate boundary segments into a lithospheric scale picture of how the plate boundary as a whole works. For these reasons, the PIs will host a Science Planning Workshop focused on the plate boundary geodynamics of New Zealand. The "output" of the workshop will be a Science Plan for plate boundary research in South Island, New Zealand. The Workshop will bring together a group of researchers from the U.S., NZ, and other countries, who have focused on various aspects of the NZ plate boundary system to both hash out issues in the current understanding and identify the first order questions that remain and thus could help drive the next generation of plate boundary research. The Science Plan could help focus research projects, make the links among disparate experiments, provide background information to plate boundary researchers less familiar with the NZ system - but with substantial insight from their research on other plate boundary systems, and provide the basis for new integrative multi-disciplinary projects. The Plan will also serve the research funding agencies , NSF and the NZ-FRST (Foundation for Research Science and Technology) in their planning.