Structural Analysis

Introduction
 Structural analysis means the determination of the structural history of an
area and the geometry and orientation of the major structures from the
study of the types and relationships of minor structure
 Minor structure or small-scale structures are those structures of tectonic
origin that can be observed with the naked eye in the field. Their scale series
between that of the hand specimen to that of the exposure or even a
mountain side
 Recognition of these minor structures and the knowledge of their origin and
significance helps the field geologist to understand the larger scale
geological structures of an area
 Minor folds
 The association of minor folds with major folds is established. The
geometry of minor folds varies around a major fold
 The minor folds have an S, M, or Z profile geometry depending on which
part of the major folds occur
 Careful mapping of the S, M, and Z. geometry of minor folds in the field will
enable the hinge and the limb regions of the major fold to be delineated
 In the field minor fold should be viewed looking down the plunge
 The axes and the axial planes of minor folds are parallel to those of the
major fold
Foliation
 Except for a variation of crenulation cleavage foliation lies parallel to or within
a few degrees of the XY plane of the finite strain ellipsoid, etc
 Foliation is often parallel or sub-parallel to the axial plane of the folds at the
same time or in association with the foliation
 These foliations are called axial plane foliation, because foliation often fan
about a fold hinge and refracts as it passes between beds of different
lithologies foliation is rarely axial planner except at the folds hinge
 However, regardless of whether the foliation is parallel to the axial plane or
fans or refracts its intersection with the bedding is usually parallel to the axis of
the major folds which it is associated
Boudinage and pinch and swell structures
 Boudins and folds may be form during a single deformation if the
boudins are formed because the limbs of the folds rotate into the
extension files as the folds amplify, the boudins length will be parallel
to the folds axis
 Bot boudins may also form with their length normal to the folds hinge
when the strain associated with folding is such that a significant
extension occurs along the fold hinge line
Mullions and rodding structures
 Mullions and rodding structures are both forms of a coarse lineation
develop in a rock which have been strongly deformed
 They are parallel to local folds hinge
 Mullions are structures formed from country rocks
 Rods are monomineralic sticks like lines bodies generally quartz
enclosed in metamorphosed country rocks
 Mullions may be formed in a variety of ways and classified into three
groups
• Folds mullions or bedding mullions
• Cleavage (foliation) mullions
• Irregular mullions
 Many are combination of these three types
 Folds mullions have regular curved, cylindrical surfaces which
correspond to the original bedding
 Bedding mullions are undulations of the bedding plane surface which
have been smoothed locally they can be formed by pinch and swell
structure developing in a single bed cleavage mullions are length prism
which may be angular or parallel rounded in cross-section. The prism
surfaces are cleavage surfaces
 Irregular mullions are the most common. They are long, cylindrical
structure, but in cross section irregular
 All mullions may occur together in one area and they are parallel to each
other and the major folds axes
Lineation
The major types of lineation in deformed rocks are:
• Mineral lineation – sometimes on a foliation plane
• Bedding / foliation intersection
• Relating coarse lineation = defined by hinges of minor folds, and axes
of boudins, mullions and rods
• Crenulation lineation
• Slickenside or crystal fibers which form on fault planes and bedding
planes
 The mechanism by which minerals are aligned in a rock during
deformation to produce a fabric is by growth or recrystallization in to
a preferred orientation in respond to an applied non-hydrostatic
stress
 States of three-dimension strain can be represented on a Flinn
diagram which can be divided into stretching and a flattening field
 Extreme examples are represented by the prolate (constriction) and
oblate (flattening) strain ellipsoid respectively
What mineral fabric will form with these two types of strain?
 In pure oblate (flattening) strain field are fabric (an S-tectonite will
form regardless of whether the fabric elements are planar
 In pure prolate (constriction) strain field both these fabric elements
are reoriented to form linear fabric (L- tectonite)
 There is a complete spectrum between these two extreme strain
states
 These intermediate fabrics have both planar and linear characteristic
and are called L-S tectonite, these are sometimes called composite
fabrics
 Many slaty cleavages composite fabrics
 In addition to the parallel alignment of mica flakes the long axes of
the micas are aligned in the cleavage plane producing a lineation
 When mineral lineation develops in a cleavage (foliation) or
schistosity plane containing fossils or other strain markers
The mineral elongation is seen to be parallel to the maximum
extension
So they are called stretching lineations
Shear Zone
 Shear which may be arranged in networks are formed on all scales of
thousands of kilometers
 It is clear that an increase in strain occurs from the surroundings into
the zone
 The shear zone consists of converging and diverging belts of
subparallel lithologies enclosing less or even undeformed augen
Minor Structures associated with shear zones
 Homogeneous and heterogeneous simple shear during the
deformation, the maximum principal compressive stress acts at 45° to
the shear zone margins
 Many minor structures found in association with shear zone form in
response of this stress
 Mineral filled tension veins. These form parallel to the maximum
principal compression and are often arranged en echelon within the
shear zone
 With progressive deformation the vein may rotate, but because the
orientations if the principal stresses are fixed with respect to the
shear zone margin, the vein will continue to grow at 45° to the margin
 This result in the curved or sigmoidal tension veins and the amount of
rotation of the veins reflects the amount of shear
 This will vary along the length of the shear zone being maximum in
the central region X and minimum at the shear zone end Y, more
complex arrays of veins may occur if they develop at different times
during the formation of the shear zone, early veins at a particular
locality being more sigmoidal than later ones
 If the rock inside the shear zone responds in ductile rather than brittle
manner, then tension veins do not form and instead they may develop
a fabric at right angles to the maximum principal compression
As deformation continues, this fabric will rotate but because the
orientations of principal stresses are fixed with respect to the shear
zone boundary new fabric is always formed at 45° to the margin
Thus the shear zone fabric is commonly curved making an angle of
45⁰° to the boundary near the margin and becoming approximately
parallel to the shear zone near the centre
The Shear Zone fabric may be a mineral fabric or closely spaced
pressure solution seams
Mineral fabrics formed in shear zones are generally L-S-tectonites and
the orientation of the stretching
Direction is shown in a number of planar features are also found
which cut the shear zone fabric. Some may Correspond to Riedel
Shears
A type of crenulation cleavage can be explained
Initially the fabric is formed at right angles to the principal
compression with progressive deformation, it rotates to parallelism
with the shear Zone margin and increases in intensity some of the
minor structures associated with shear zones fabrics
Sigmoidal tension veins and shear zone fabrics are sometimes found
together
In these examples the fabric is a series of pressure solution seams
The quartz dissolved from these seams has been deposited in tension
veins
Use of Minor Structures
 The minor structures can be used to determine the geometry and
orientation of major structures and the tectonic history of an area
 In some cases they can be used to determine the stratigraphic
succession in order to determine whether an antiform is an anticline
or antisyncline if the way up of the bed is known
 The small scale structures that can be used to determine the stratigraphic
succession can be divided into two groups:
1. Sedimentary structures
2. Tectonic structures:
Certain tectonic structures to bedding can be the relationship of these
structures to bedding can be used to indicate whether they have been
inserted or not during a particular deformation where folding and foliation
have result from the same deformation
 Observation of these relationship between foliation and the stratification
can indicate not only the geometrical form of the fold but also the
stratigraphic succession
• In an area of overturned folds the dip of the normal limbs is less steep
than the dip of the fold axial plane and the dip of inverted limb is
steeper than that of the axial plane
• If the foliation is parallel to the axial plane of the fold where the
foliation and beds dip in the same direction, if the foliation is steeper
than the bedding, the beds are inverted
• This does not hold where the beds were not in their correct order of
succession before folding
 Structural data collected in the field will include
• Dip and strike of bedding planes and foliation planes
• Fold profile geometry
• The trend and angle of plunge of minor fold axes and axial plane
orientation
• Plunge of lineation e.g. intersection lineation, mineral lineation,
boudins, rods, mullion
• Data on way up
 The most suitable method to study the angular relationship between
various features is to plot them on a stereographic projection
1. Bedding planes
 Measurement of bedding A, B, C is the orientation of the tangent to the fold at that
point
 The intersection of any two tangent called a B axis is parallel to the fold and these fold
axes can be determined all circle representing bedding planes on a cylindrical fold
will pass through a common point which define the axis
 As most folds are not cylindrical they do not intersect at a single point. They cluster
around an area and the center can be taken to represent the axis
 A more practical method of great number of measurement is to plot the poles to the
planes
 The poles to bedding in a cylindrical fold are all parallel to one plane i.e. the fold
profile section and will all lie on the same great circle
From the geometry it can be seen that The pole to the great circle
containing the bedding is parallel to the fold axis
Because natural folds are generally non cylindrical the stereo
projection can show a scatter of poles, about a great circle
The inter limb angle and the style of the major fold can be
determined from the distribution of poles to bedding along the great
circle
The more open the fold the less spread out the poles will be
The inter-limb angle can be determined by rotating the stereo-
projection until the best fit great circle of the poles to bedding lies
over one of the great circles
The angular spread of the poles Ɵ can be read off from the inter-limb
angle α is = 180 – Ɵ
The distribution of poles to bedding on the great circle is also effected
by the style or angularity of the fold e.g. if the fold is a chevron fold
the points will cluster about two points on the great circle
If the fold is rounded the poles will be evenly distributed along the
great circle
 Fold geometry intermediate between these two will have pole
distributions of the type shown
The orientation of the fold axial plane of the major folds can be
determined from the plots of pole to bedding
 The axial plane of a fold is parallel to the plane which bisects the
intelimb angle and which contains the fold
The great circle representing the axial plane, must contain the pole to
the great circle of poles to bedding (i.e. the fold axis A and the mid-point
of the spread of poles to bedding B )
If poles to bedding are not spread along a great circle but because the
fold has a chevron geometry are clustered around two points then there
will be difficulty in determining the inter-limb angle
For example, the two chevron folds have identical poles to bedding
distributions
To distinguish between these two additional data are required e.g. the
orientation of the axial plane which may be indicated by an axial plane
foliation or by direct observation of a minor fold
It may be too large and /or too poorly exposed to be observed
directly in the field by plotting poles to bedding on a stereographic
projection it is possible to determine:
a) The orientation of the folds axes
b) The orientation of the axial plane
c) The style of the fold
d) The inter-limb angle
But it is not possible to distinguish between an antiform and a
synform from a plot of poles to bedding of the two folds have
identical geometries and will have identical poles to bedding planes.
This can be solved from field observations
 2. Foliation:
Because foliation which results from the same deformation event is
statistically parallel to the axial plane of a fold, poles to foliation will
lie on the same great circle as poles to bedding and ideally will plot go
from the midpoint B of the bedding pole scatter
Because foliation generally refracts as it passes through layers of
different compositions and fans about the hinge plane, the poles to
foliation will not plot at a single point but will be scattered along the
great circle about a point
 3. Lineations:
All Lineations formed during a particular deformation will cluster
about a point on a stereoprojection e.g. intersection. Lineation, minor
fold axes, rodding, boudin, mineral lineation
If the Lineations do not plot around a point but are spread across the
projection, this indicates that more than one episode of deformation
has affected the area
The Lineations belong to an early deformation and have been
deformed by a later deformation