[Rockhounds] Researchers Unearth the Mysteries of How Turkey’s East Anatolian Fault Formed

[Kreigh Tomaszewski]

An international team led by the University of Minnesota Twin Cities
<https://scitechdaily.com/tag/university-of-minnesota/> has successfully
determined the age and formation process of the East Anatolian fault,
extending from the east to south-central regions of Turkey and instrumental
in the formation of the Anatolian tectonic plate.

The fault zone was the site of two devastating earthquakes that occurred in
Turkey and Syria in February 2023. While the researchers’ findings won’t
help predict the timing or size of earthquakes, it allows geologists to
learn more about how long the area has been seismically active and how
major earthquakes have shaped the landscape over time, which can help drive
decision-making for infrastructure and placement of homes.

Their paper is published in *Geology, *a leading peer-reviewed academic
journal covering the geosciences fields published by the Geological Society
of America.

The faults we see on the Earth’s surface are cracks caused by the movements
of the planet’s massive tectonic plates. These movements cause stress to
build up, and the release of that stress causes the earthquakes humans
experience on the surface.

“There are lots of tectonic plates in the world,” explained Donna Whitney,
lead author of the paper and a Distinguished McKnight University Professor
in the University of Minnesota N.H. Winchell School of Earth and
Environmental Sciences. “They’ve changed shape and size and position over
time, but we very seldom get to see one form. The Anatolian plate formed
fairly recently in a geological sense, so the processes that formed it are
easier for us to deduce from studying the geology. There’s been a lot of
debate about the age of the Anatolian plate and the East Anatolian fault,
but we were able to show with our data that it likely formed five million
years ago.”

https://scitechdaily.com/unlocking-seismic-secrets-researchers-unearth-the-mysteries-of-how-turkeys-east-anatolian-fault-formed/?expand_article=1