ABSTRACT Field studies and interpretative mapping of the area southeast of Stenkul Fiord (Ellesmere Island) revealed that the Margaret Formation clastic deposits consist of at least four sedimentary units (Units 1–4) separated by unconformities. Several centimeter-thick volcanic ash layers, identified within coal layers and preserved as crandallite group minerals (Ca-bearing goyazite), suggest an intense volcanic ash fall activity. Based on new U-Pb zircon dating (ID-TIMS) of three ash samples from one layer, this activity took place at 53.7 Ma in the early Eocene, i.e., within the period of the Eocene Thermal Maximum 2 hyperthermal. This age further suggests that the lowermost Unit 1 can be assigned to the late Paleocene–earliest Eocene, Unit 2 to the early Eocene, whereas Units 3 and 4 might be early to middle Eocene in age. Sedimentation was followed and partly accompanied by compressive Eurekan deformation after ~53.7 Ma, which led to the formation of fold and fault structures. Several pulses of deformation caused uplift and erosion and were followed by sedimentation of the next unit above an unconformity. Deformation presumably ended before the middle Eocene. An earlier phase of probably extensional Eurekan deformation in Unit 1 can be assigned to the latest Paleocene–earliest Eocene. These results show that Paleocene/Eocene sedimentation and Eurekan deformation represent a protracted history comprising several phases of ongoing clastic sedimentation, deformation, uplift, and erosion. This suggests that the Eurekan deformation on Ellesmere Island cannot be assigned to a single fixed time in the Paleogene only.

ABSTRACT Structural analysis of Neoproterozoic to lower Paleozoic rocks near Old Crow, in North Yukon, show that they were affected by widespread, but distributed sinistral shear zone deformation. This tectonic event occurred under brittle-ductile conditions, in the early Paleozoic, prior to intrusion of Late Devonian granitoids of the Old Crow plutonic suite (368–375 Ma). Although outcrops are scattered, the shear zone deformation can be inferred to extend over a broad ~W–E corridor, ~10–20 km-wide and ~145 km long, from eastern Alaska into northern Yukon. The sinistral Porcupine shear zone is interpreted to represent a major, early Paleozoic crustal structure along which elements of NE Laurentian and Caledonian affinities in the Arctic Alaska terrane were transferred across the Arctic region during the Paleozoic. Our observations do not support major Paleogene dextral strike-slip deformation along the Porcupine River near Old Crow.

ABSTRACT The sinistral Wegener Fault in the Nares Strait between northwest Greenland and eastern Ellesmere Island (Canadian Arctic) represents a tectonic element in the Arctic whose existence and significance have been controversial for more than 50 years. Some workers interpret the Wegener Fault as an important early Tertiary transform related to movement of the Greenland plate relative to the North American plate. Others view it as insignificant or reject its existence. While onshore studies in the Canadian portion of the northern Nares Strait region have proven the existence of important sinistral strike-slip faults related to the offshore Wegener Fault, the southern continuation of the Wegener Fault in the southern Kane Basin and Smith Sound is unclear. In particular, Smith Sound has been interpreted as a location of an undisturbed continuation of the Proterozoic basement from Greenland to Ellesmere Island, with only one possible location of the Wegener Fault near the east coast of Ellesmere Island. Our structural studies along the west coast of Smith Sound and adjacent areas of eastern Ellesmere Island suggest a three-phase tectonic evolution. Phase 1 is a brittle deformation (strike-slip faults, partly as conjugate sets) that took place under ~NW–SE shortening. It also occurs at the Smith Sound coast and did not affect the Paleogene deposits. Structures of this phase are assigned to the Paleocene and can be related to the Wegener Fault in the offshore area of Smith Sound just east of the eastern coast of Ellesmere Island. Deposition of thick conglomerates of the Paleocene Cape Lawrence Formation and relatively younger clastic sediments of the Eureka Sound Group (Paleocene–?Eocene) is interpreted to be related to local depocenters associated with the sinistral Wegener Fault. Following uplift and subsidence during normal faulting associated with Phase 2 deformation, younger contractional deformation under ~NE–SW shortening (strike-slip faults, partly as conjugate sets) of Phase 3 deformation also affected the Paleogene deposits. Phases 2 and 3 can both be assigned to the Eocene. Our interpretation points to a polyphase deformational history in the early Paleogene, which partly interfered with deposition of Paleogene clastic sediments. The first deformational phase in the Paleocene is related to the sinistral Wegener Fault, which, in the offshore areas, is not interpreted as a distinct through-going plane but as displaced by ~W–E striking faults. Therefore, our observation and interpretation support the existence of this fault in the southern Nares Strait region, east of the Ellesmere Island coast in Smith Sound.

Abstract The crustal seismic velocity model (based on receiver functions) of Ellesmere Island and the structural geological cross-section of Ellesmere Island, both documented and discussed elsewhere in this volume, are here integrated into a crustal-scale transect crossing all the main tectonic domains. The velocity model satisfies much of the observed gravity field, but implies minor modifications with potentially important implications for characterizing the lower crust over the transect. The crust of the Pearya Terrane includes a high-velocity and high-density lower crustal body, suggested to represent a mafic underplate linked to the emplacement of the High Arctic Large Igneous Province. A similar body also lies directly beneath the Hazen Plateau, but this is more likely to be inherited from earlier tectonic stages than to be linked to the High Arctic Large Igneous Province. A large-scale basement-involving thrust, possibly linked to a deep detachment of Ellesmerian age, lies immediately south of the Pearya Terrane and forms the northern backdrop to a crustal-scale pop-up structure that accommodates Eurekan-aged shortening in northern Ellesmere Island. The thickest crust and deepest Moho along the transect are below the Central Ellesmerian fold belt, where the Moho is flexured downwards to the north to a depth of about 48 km beneath the load of the structurally thickened supracrustal strata of the fold belt.