Mathieu Rodriguez

Bio: Mathieu Rodriguez is an academic researcher from École Normale Supérieure. The author has contributed to research in topics: Fracture zone & Transform fault. The author has an hindex of 10, co-authored 22 publications receiving 318 citations. Previous affiliations of Mathieu Rodriguez include Indiana Statewide Testing for Educational Progress-Plus & Centre national de la recherche scientifique.

Neotectonics of the Owen Fracture Zone (NW Indian Ocean): Structural evolution of an oceanic strike-slip plate boundary

Abstract: The Owen Fracture Zone is a 800 km-long fault system that accommodates the dextral strike-slip motion between India and Arabia plates. Because of slow pelagic sedimentation rates that preserve the seafloor expression of the fault since the Early Pliocene, the fault is clearly observed on bathymetric data. It is made up of a series of fault segments separated by releasing and restraining bends, including a major pull-apart basin at latitude 20°N. Some distal turbiditic channels from the Indus deep-sea fan overlap the fault system and are disturbed by its activity, thus providing landmarks to date successive stages of fault activity and structural evolution of the Owen Fracture Zone from Pliocene to Present. We determine the durability of relay structures and the timing of their evolution along the principal displacement zone, from their inception to their extinction. We observe subsidence migration in the 20°N basin, and alternate activation of fault splays in the vicinity of the Qalhat seamount. The present-day Owen Fracture Zone is the latest stage of structural evolution of the 20-Myr-old strike-slip fault system buried under Indus turbiditic deposits whose activity started at the eastern foot of the Owen Ridge when the Gulf of Aden opened. The evolution of the Owen Fracture Zone since 3-6 Myr reflects a steady state plate motion between Arabia and India, such as inferred by kinematics for the last 20 Myr period. The structural evolution of the Owen Fracture Zone since 20 Myr- including fault segments propagation and migration, pull-apart basin opening and extinction - seems to be characterized by a progressive reorganisation of the fault system, and does not require any major kinematics change.

Owen Ridge deep-water submarine landslides: implications for tsunami hazard along the Oman coast

Abstract: . The recent discovery of voluminous submarine landslides along the Owen Ridge may represent a source of tsunami hazard for the nearby Oman coast. We assess the severity of this potential hazard by performing numerical simulations of tsunami generation and propagation from the biggest landslide (40 km3 in volume) observed along the Owen Ridge. A finite-difference model, assimilating the landslide to a visco-plastic flow, simulates tsunami generation. Computation results show that Salalah city (190 000 inhabitants) is impacted by 2.5 m-high tsunami waves one hour after sediment failure. Higher wave elevation values (4 m) are reached in the low populated Sawqara Bay over 80 min after slide initiation. Although large submarine failures along remote oceanic ridges are infrequent, this study reveals an underestimated source of tsunami hazard in the Arabian Sea.

Classification of offshore mass movements

Abstract: More than 100 offshore mass-movement deposits have been studied in Holocene and Pleistocene sediments. The processes can be divided into three main types: slides/slumps, plastic flows, and turbidity currents, of which 13 main varieties have been recognized. The three types are differentiated mainly by motion, architecture, and shape of failure surface. For slides, the morphology of deposits can usually be linked to a process, but for plastic flows and turbidity currents, information about the motion is mainly provided by the sedimentary record. A static classification based on these features is given, and is related to a dynamic classification system to try to underline the morphological transformation of an offshore event from initiation to deposition.

Trends in large-deformation analysis of landslide mass movements with particular emphasis on the material point method

Abstract: Traditional geotechnical analyses for landslides involve failure prediction (i.e. onset of failure) and the design of structures that can safely withstand the applied loads. The analyses provide limited information on the post-failure behaviour. Modern numerical methods are able to simulate large mass movements and there is an opportunity to utilise such methods to evaluate the risks of catastrophic damage if a landslide occurs. In this paper, various large-deformation analysis methods are introduced and their applicability for solving landslide problems is discussed. Since catastrophic landslides often involve seepage forces, consideration of the coupled behaviour of soil and pore fluid is essential. Two approaches to model soil–pore fluid coupling in large-deformation analysis using the material point method (MPM) are introduced. An example simulation is presented for each approach; one on a model levee failure and the other on a natural cut slope failure (the Selborne experiment conducted by Cooper and co-workers in 1998). In the levee failure case, MPM simulation was able to capture a complex failure mechanism including the development of successive shear bands. The simulation was also able to predict excess pore pressure generation during the failure propagation and the subsequent consolidation stage. The simulations demonstrated the importance of the dilation characteristics of soil as well as changes in geometry for the post-failure behaviour. In the Selborne case, MPM was able to simulate the progressive failure of brittle, overconsolidated clay. The evolution of shear stresses along the failure surface was also captured by the MPM. The changes in the pore pressure and the actual shape of the failure surface were simulated by the MPM. The importance of accurately modelling the shear band within the MPM framework is highlighted.

The Quest for the Africa-Eurasia plate boundary West of the Strait of Gibraltar

Abstract: The missing link in the plate boundary between Eurasia and Africa in the central Atlantic is presented and discussed. A set of almost linear and sub parallel dextral strike–slip faults, the SWIM1 Faults, that form a narrow band of deformation over a length of 600 km coincident with a small circle centred on the pole of rotation of Africa with respect to Eurasia, was mapped using a new swath bathymetry compilation available in the area offshore SW Portugal. These faults connect the Gloria Fault to the Rif–Tell Fault Zone, two segments of the plate boundary between Africa and Eurasia. The SWIM faults cut across the Gulf of Cadiz, in the Atlantic Ocean, where the 1755 Great Lisbon earthquake, M ~ 8.5–8.7, and tsunami were generated, providing a new insight on its source location.

The breakup of East Gondwana: Assimilating constraints from Cretaceous ocean basins around India into a best‐fit tectonic model

Abstract: Published models for the Cretaceous sea!oor-spreading history of East Gondwana result in unlikely tectonic scenarios for at least one of the plate boundaries involved and/or violate particular constraints from at least one of the associated ocean basins. We link East Gondwana spreading corridors by integrating magnetic and gravity anomaly data from the Enderby Basin off East Antarctica within a regional plate kinematic framework to identify a conjugate series of east-west-trending magnetic anomalies, M4 to M0 (~126.7–120.4 Ma). The mid-ocean ridge that separated Greater India from Australia-Antarctica propagated from north to south, starting at ~136Ma northwest of Australia, and reached the southern tip of India at ~126 Ma. Sea!oor spreading in the Enderby Basin was abandoned at ~115 Ma, when a ridge jump transferred the Elan Bank and South Kerguelen Plateau to the Antarctic plate. Our revised plate kinematic model helps resolve the problem of successive two-way strike-slip motion between Madagascar and India seen in many previously published reconstructions and also suggests that sea!oor spreading between them progressed from south to north from 94 to 84 Ma. This timing is essential for tectonic !ow lines to match the curved fracture zones of the Wharton and Enderby basins, as Greater India gradually began to unzip from Madagascar from ~100 Ma. In our model, the 85-East Ridge and Kerguelen Fracture Zone formed as conjugate !anks of a "leaky" transform fault following the ~100Ma spreading reorganization. Our model also identi"es the Afanasy Nikitin Seamounts as products of the Conrad Rise hotspot.