CaltechAUTHORS
Published January 12, 1996 | Version Submitted
Journal Article Open

Origin of High Mountains in the Continents: The Southern Sierra Nevada

Creators

  • 1. ROR icon California Institute of Technology
  • 2. ROR icon University of Colorado Boulder
  • 3. ROR icon University of California, Riverside
  • 4. ROR icon Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
  • 5. ROR icon Stanford University
  • 6. ROR icon San Diego State University
  • 7. ROR icon The University of Texas at El Paso
  • 8. ROR icon United States Geological Survey
  • 9. ROR icon Duke University
  • 10. ROR icon Princeton University

Abstract

Active and passive seismic experiments show that the southern Sierra, despite standing 1.8 to 2.8 kilometers above its surroundings, is underlain by crust of similar seismic thickness, about 30 to 40 kilometers. Thermobarometry of xenolith suites and magnetotelluric profiles indicate that the upper mantle is eclogitic to depths of 60 kilometers beneath the western and central parts of the range, but little subcrustal lithosphere is present beneath the eastern High Sierra and adjacent Basin and Range. These and other data imply the crust of both the High Sierra and Basin and Range thinned by a factor of 2 since 20 million years ago, at odds with purported late Cenozoic regional uplift of some 2 kilometers.

Additional Information

© 1996 American Association for the Advancement of Science. 30 August 1995; accepted 14 November 1995. Supported by the Continental Dynamics Program of the National Science Foundation (EAR-9120690 to S.P., EAR-9120688 to G.J., EAR-9119263 to P.M., and EAR-9120689 to R.P.), the Department of Energy (DE-FG03-93ER14311 to R.C.), the U.S. Navy (China Lake Naval Weapons Center), and the U.S. Air Force (Office of Scientific Research). Key logistical support was provided by the National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management, and U.S. Forest Service.

Attached Files

Submitted - Origin_of_High_Mountains_in_the_Continents.pdf

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Origin_of_High_Mountains_in_the_Continents.pdf

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Additional details

Identifiers

Eprint ID
34893
Resolver ID
CaltechAUTHORS:20121015-105100386

Funding

NSF
EAR-9120690
NSF
EAR-9120688
NSF
EAR-9119263
NSF
EAR-9120689
Department of Energy (DOE)
DE-FG03-93ER14311
U. S. Navy (China Lake Naval Weapons Center)
Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR)

Dates

Created
2012-10-15
Created from EPrint's datestamp field
Updated
2022-08-15
Created from EPrint's last_modified field

Caltech Custom Metadata

Caltech groups
Seismological Laboratory , Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences (GPS)