| Session Details | |
| Section | SE - Solid Earth Sciences |
| Session Title | Tectonic and magmatic evolution of western Pacific marginal basins |
| Main Convener | Prof. Sang-Mook Lee (Seoul National University, Korea, South) |
| Co-convener(s) | Dr. Jun-ichiro Ishibashi (Kyushu University, Japan) Dr. Toshiya Fujiwara (Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology, Japan) Prof. Dietmar Muller (University of Sydney, Australia) |
| Session Description | The western Pacific is host to numerous marginal basins many of which have formed as a result of change in motions of major plates during Cenozoic. These basins extend from Sea of Okhotsk and Sea of Japan (East Sea) to the north, South China Sea, basins in the Philippine Sea plate, active basins along Izu-Bonin Mariana trenches and Melanesian borderland, and down to the south along Tonga-Kermadec trenches. Many of these basins developed as a result of back-arc opening and have geologic structure and volcanic/magmatic manifestations, which are important sources of exchange in material and energy between deep earth and exterior including hydrosphere, atmosphere and biosphere. Understanding the formation and evolution of marginal basins has been a key question for geoscientists. The marginal basins are also of societal importance. The regions around the basins are among the most populated and industrialized places on the earth and are where we obtain much of resources including gas and petroleum. They are also regions venerable to natural hazards such as earthquakes and tsunamis. In recent decades many governmental agencies have been developing strategies to manage resources and mitigate possible hazards within their marine territories. While a lot of efforts including marine surveys are being conducted by individual countries, not much effort has been made to understand the geological phenomena that have shaped those basins which often require investigations far back into the past. In this session, we invite scientific contributions that have improved our knowledge of tectonic and magmatic events that have shaped the marginal basins. These include new survey results, measurements, modeling work and interpretations. |