Strike-Slip Terrains and Transform Margins

Many of the world's continents are bounded or traversed by vast fault networks that move laterally, like the well-known San Andreas Fault. As well as being major tectonic features of the Earth's surface, these strike-slip regimes are vitally important to the world's natural resources – petroleum, water, and geothermal energy. This book covers all aspects of these regimes; how they initiate; how they develop; and the natural resources associated with them. Numerous global case studies illustrate structural development, thermal and fluid flow implications, and commercial applicability. No other book provides such a comprehensive overview of these settings, and this volume will stand as a critical reference of the state of knowledge of strike-slip terrains and transform margins. It will be invaluable for a broad range of readers, from advanced students of geology and researchers specializing in strike-slip regimes to geoscientists and managers involved in natural resources and energy solutions.

• This volume focuses on the mechanisms of strike-slip terrains, their large-scale controlling factors and their implications, providing a comprehensive background on this widespread structural regime, describing models, physical processes and mathematical formulation that will stand the test of time
• This volume contains case studies from around the world, enabling the reader to understand the common characteristics of these structural terrains, and hence their potential applicability to new study areas worldwide
• This volume stresses the importance of synthesis as a scientific principle and shows the benefits of a multidisciplinary approach, using independent data sets, to arrive at the most likely explanation of the phenomena described