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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Earth Sci.
Sec. Structural Geology and Tectonics
Volume 12 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/feart.2024.1471172

Thermal and burial history of the axial Arcabuco-Floresta segment, Eastern Cordillera basin, Colombia: evidence from low-temperature thermochronology and numerical modelling

Provisionally accepted
John J. Sandoval-Espinel John J. Sandoval-Espinel 1Leidy C. Sandoval-Espinel Leidy C. Sandoval-Espinel 1Mauricio A. Bermudez Mauricio A. Bermudez 1*Matthias Bernet Matthias Bernet 2Barry Kohn Barry Kohn 3Sergio Amaya Sergio Amaya 4Nicolas Villamizar-Escalante Nicolas Villamizar-Escalante 5Carlos A. Zuluaga Carlos A. Zuluaga 6
  • 1 Universidad Pedagógica y Tecnológica de Colombia, Tunja, Colombia
  • 2 Université Grenoble Alpes, Saint Martin d'Hères, Auvergne-Rhone-Alpes, France
  • 3 The University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria, Australia
  • 4 Universidad de Santander, Bucaramanga, Santander, Colombia
  • 5 University of Salzburg, Salzburg, Salzburg, Austria
  • 6 National University of Colombia, Bogotá, Bogota, Colombia

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    The Eastern Cordillera basin of Colombia exhibits a complex geological history characterized by both along and across strike variations in deformation and exhumation, which provide valuable insights into the broader tectonic evolution of the Andean region. This study provides a new perspective on the exhumation history of the axial region of the Eastern Cordillera along the Arcabuco-Floresta segment through thermal and burial history modeling based on existing apatite and zircon fissiontrack (FT) and (U-Th)/He (He) data, together with new ZFT and ZHe data. Single grain ZHe data from Devonian to Lower Cretaceous strata range from ca. 74 to 20 Ma. ZFT data from the same samples show a broader age distribution ranging from ca. 200 to 70 Ma. Integration of different inverse modeling approaches suggest that exhumation occurred since the Late Cretaceous in three distinct events. First, from the Late Cretaceous to Eocene related to the accretion of different oceanic terranes related to Farallon Plate. Second, from the Oligocene to the Middle Miocene, likely as a compressional response to the accretion of the Panamá-Chocó Arc, Nazca Plate and the Gorgona Terrane. Third from the Middle Miocene to Pleistocene, which may be linked to exhumation driven by the final phase of the Panamá-Chocó Arc and interactions with Nazca and Caribbean plates. 1 Different geometries and positions of oceanic crust subduction below this corner of the South American plate have been identified by various authors (

    Keywords: Thermal history modelling, Low temperature thermochronology, Burial history, Exhumation, Eastern Cordillera, Colombia

    Received: 26 Jul 2024; Accepted: 04 Nov 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Sandoval-Espinel, Sandoval-Espinel, Bermudez, Bernet, Kohn, Amaya, Villamizar-Escalante and Zuluaga. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Mauricio A. Bermudez, Universidad Pedagógica y Tecnológica de Colombia, Tunja, Colombia

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