Geological Society of America

187 D8. Recent Advances in Geophysics/Geodynamics (Posters)

Tuesday, 12 October 2021
2:30 PM - 6:30 PM
Exhibit Hall A

CRUSTAL CONFIGURATION OF THE NAAMA AND EL BAYADH REGION OF NORTHWEST ALGERIA: INFERENCES FROM A GRAVITY AND MAGNETIC ANALYSIS

Paper number: 187-3
Program: Technical Sessions
Time: 2:30 PM – 6:30 PM

Authors

Walid Farhi Presenting Author
University Khemis Miliana, Ain Defla
Hakim Saibi
College of Science, United Arab Emirates University, Al-Ain
Kevin Mickus
Missouri State University, Springfield, MO
Yoann Quensel
CNRS, IRD, INRAe, Coll France, Aix-en-Provence
Abdelwahab Aktouf
Sonatrach, Boumerdes
Amar Boudella
University of Science and Technology Houari Boumediene, Algiers

Abstract

Northwestern Algeria is located in a region where the Saharan Atlas borders the Saharan Platform along the South Atlas Front. The origin of the South Atlas Front is controversial, thus a detailed gravity and magnetic analysis constrained by seismic reflection profiles and well data was conducted to determine the structural configuration of this region. A residual gravity anomaly map created using upward continuation and a reduced to the pole magnetic anomaly map indicated a series of northwest-trending maxima anomalies parallel to the Atlassic orogeny folds and faults within the Saharan Atlas and east-trending maxima within the Benoud foreland basin. These maxima mostly coincide with basement uplifts based on seismic reflection profiles. Depth analyses based on upward continuation, two-dimensional forward modeling and 3D inversion models of the gravity and magnetic data indicated that the source of the maxima are mainly 5 km in depth with the magnetic sources being deeper than the gravity sources. The gravity and magnetic models indicate that the source bodies are steep-sided and coincide with interpreted faults from the seismic reflection profiles. The maxima anomalies are interpreted to mainly be caused by basement uplifts instead of variations in density and/or magnetic susceptibility in the Paleozoic or older basement lithologies. The analysis of the gravity and magnetic data suggests that the South Atlas Front in western Algeria was formed by a mixture of thin- and thick-skinned tectonics.

Geological Society of America Abstracts with Programs. Vol. 53, No. 6

doi: 10.1130/abs/2021AM-365376

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