The work shows significant variations at the boundary between layers of the Earth.
A new study made by researchers at the Institute of Earth Sciences Jaume Almera of the Spanish National Research Council (ICTJA-CSIC) has been able to describe the effects of the lithospheric structure on the topography of the Strait of Gibraltar area. This new researh shows the deep structure of the plate boundary between Africa and Eurasia across the Gibraltar Arc. It describes the distribution of density, temperature and composition of the lithosphere and sublithosphere ( up to 400 km deep).
The study, published recently in “Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth”, estimates that the topography of the Strait of Gibraltar in the orogenic domain of the Betics and the Rif subsides by 1500 meters and is linked to the subduction in the Gibraltar Arc region.
"We’ve been able to describe the lithospheric geometry and to identify sublithospheric anomalies of temperature and density and to link them with their topographic effects on the surface, in the area of the Gibraltar Strait and the Alborán Sea ", said Ivone Jiménez-Munt, a researcher at the ICTJA-CSIC and first author of the study.
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