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A transform fault or transform boundary, is a fault along a plate boundary where the motion is predominantly horizontal. [1] It ends abruptly where it connects to another plate boundary, either another transform, a spreading ridge, or a subduction zone. [2] A transform fault is a special case of a strike-slip fault that also forms a plate boundary.
Strike-slip tectonics or wrench tectonics is a type of tectonics that is dominated by lateral (horizontal) movements within the Earth's crust (and lithosphere).Where a zone of strike-slip tectonics forms the boundary between two tectonic plates, this is known as a transform or conservative plate boundary.
Strike-slip faults with left-lateral motion are also known as sinistral faults and those with right-lateral motion as dextral faults. [18] Each is defined by the direction of movement of the ground as would be seen by an observer on the opposite side of the fault. A special class of strike-slip fault is the transform fault when it forms a plate ...
Magmatism along strike-slip faults is the process of rock melting, magma ascent and emplacement, associated with the tectonics and geometry of various strike-slip settings, most commonly occurring along transform boundaries at mid-ocean ridge spreading centres [1] and at strike-slip systems parallel to oblique subduction zones. [2]
As the plates on either side of an offset mid-ocean ridge move, a transform fault forms at the offset between the two ridges. [2] Fracture zones and the transform faults that form them are separate but related features. Transform faults are plate boundaries, meaning that on either side of the fault is a different plate.
A fault bend, or fault stepover, forms when individual segments of the fault overlap and link together. The type of structures which form along the strike-slip fault depend on the sense of slip relative to the sense of stepping. When a sinistral fault steps to the right or a dextral fault steps to the left, a restraining bend is formed. [2]
The Motagua Fault, which crosses through Guatemala, is a transform boundary between the southern edge of the North American plate and the northern edge of the Caribbean plate. New Zealand's Alpine Fault is another active transform boundary. The Dead Sea Transform (DST) fault which runs through the Jordan River Valley in the Middle East.
Diagram of fault geometry (in map view) that leads to transtension at the bend or step-over. Releasing bends are transtensional structures that form where the orientation of a strike-slip fault becomes oblique to the regional slip vector causing local extension (such as a right stepping bend on a right-lateral fault). [1]