Cenozoic tectonic subsidence in the Southern Continental Margin, South China Sea

Abstract

We analyzed two recently acquired multichannel seismic profiles across the Dangerous Grounds and the Reed Bank area in the South China Sea. Reconstruction of the tectonic subsidence shows that the southern continental margin can be divided into three stages with variable subsidence rate. A delay of tectonic subsidence existed in both areas after a break-up, which was likely related to the major mantle convection during seafloor spreading, that was triggered by the secondary mantle convection below the continental margin, in addition to the variation in lithospheric thickness. Meanwhile, the stage with delayed subsidence rate differed along strikes. In the Reed Bank area, this stage is between 32–23.8 Ma, while in the Dangerous Grounds, it was much later (between 19–15.5 Ma). We believe the propagated rifting in the South China Sea dominated the changes of this delayed subsidence rate stage.

Keywords

dangerous ground / Reed Bank area / tectonic subsidence / secondary mantle convection / propagated rifting

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Acknowledgments

We want to thank the anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments. This paper benefits from early discussions with Peter D Clift from State Louisiana Univeristy. This work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 41376066), the National Program on Global Change and Air-Sea Interaction, SOA (No. GASI-GEOGE-01), MOST of China (No. 2016YFC0600402), and Continental Shelf Drilling Project (No. GZH201100202).

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