Journal article

Uplift and denudation history of the eastern Dead Sea rift flank, SW Jordan: Evidence from apatite fission track thermochronometry

S Feinstein, M Eyal, BP Kohn, MS Steckler, KM Ibrahim, BK Moh'D, Y Tian

Tectonics | Published : 2013

Abstract

The Dead Sea rift (DSR), developed along the Dead Sea transform plate boundary, is characterized by salient flanks and morphotectonic asymmetry. Apatite fission track thermochronology (AFT) along ~1200 m high vertical profiles in Neoproterozoic basement and overlying Cambrian sandstone in southwestern Jordan is used to reconstruct timing, magnitude, and rate of uplift and denudation of the eastern DSR flank and examine its relationship to rift development and its flank landscape. Time-temperature models based on AFT data suggest three major Phanerozoic heating and cooling episodes, Late Paleozoic, Early Cretaceous, and Oligocene. The latest episode, on which this study focuses, indicates upl..

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University of Melbourne Researchers

Grants

Awarded by United States-Israel Binational Science Foundation (BSF), Jerusalem, Israel


Funding Acknowledgements

This study was supported by grant no. 97-248 from the United States-Israel Binational Science Foundation (BSF), Jerusalem, Israel and an award from the Australian Institute of Nuclear Science and Engineering (AINSE) to cover neutron irradiation costs for fission track samples. The University of Melbourne thermochronology laboratory receives infrastructure support under the AuScope Program of NCRIS. Asaf Raza and David Belton (both at University of Melbourne) also assisted with some of the apatite fission track data acquisition. Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory publication number 7733. We are grateful to T. Aheler and two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments.