Regional Geology of Mount Diablo, California: Its Tectonic Evolution on the North America Plate Boundary
CONTAINS OPEN ACCESS

Mount Diablo and the geology of the Central California Coast Ranges are the subject of a volume celebrating the Northern California Geological Society’s 75th anniversary. The breadth of research illustrates the complex Mesozoic to Cenozoic tectonic evolution of the plate boundary. Recent faulting and folding along the eastern edge of the San Andreas system have exposed in the mountain a core of Franciscan accretionary wedge complex faulted against Cretaceous and Cenozoic forearc strata. The Memoir includes papers on structure, stratigraphy, tephrochronology, zircon provenance studies, apatite fission track analyses, and foraminifera and calcareous plankton assemblages tied to Cenozoic climate events. Chapters also address the history of geologic work in the area and the resource development of oil and gas, mercury, coal, and sand, and road aggregate.
Field and petrographic reconnaissance of Franciscan complex rocks of Mount Diablo, California: Imbricated ocean floor stratigraphy with a roof exhumation fault system
-
Published:September 27, 2021
-
CiteCitation
John Wakabayashi, 2021. "Field and petrographic reconnaissance of Franciscan complex rocks of Mount Diablo, California: Imbricated ocean floor stratigraphy with a roof exhumation fault system", Regional Geology of Mount Diablo, California: Its Tectonic Evolution on the North America Plate Boundary, Raymond Sullivan, Doris Sloan, Jeffrey R. Unruh, David P. Schwartz
Download citation file:
- Share
-
Tools
ABSTRACT
Franciscan subduction complex rocks of Mount Diablo form a 8.5 by 4.5 km tectonic window, elongated E-W and fault-bounded to the north and south by rocks of the Coast Range ophiolite and Great Valley Group, respectively, which lack the burial metamorphism and deformation displayed by the Franciscan complex. Most of the Franciscan complex consists of a stack of lawsonite-albite–facies pillow basalt overlain successively by chert and clastic sedimentary rocks, repeated by faults at hundreds of meters to <1 m spacing. Widely distributed mélange zones from 0.5 to 300 m thick containing high-grade (including amphibolite and eclogite) assemblages and other...
- basalts
- block structures
- burial
- California
- Cenozoic
- Coast Range Ophiolite
- Coast Ranges
- Contra Costa County California
- deformation
- exhumation
- exotic terranes
- faults
- field studies
- folds
- foliation
- Franciscan Complex
- Great Valley Sequence
- igneous rocks
- imbricate tectonics
- Jurassic
- marine environment
- melange
- Mesozoic
- metamorphism
- mineral assemblages
- Neogene
- ophiolite
- Paleogene
- petrography
- plate tectonics
- stratigraphic units
- subduction
- systems
- tectonics
- terranes
- Tertiary
- thickness
- United States
- volcanic rocks
- Mount Diablo