Scaled Physical Modeling Of Strike-slip Belts

Strike-slip structures are strictly related to oil and gas. Its deformation characteristics and mechanics are important for our explore and exploit of oil basins. With the development of petroleum industry, scholars do more research on the strike-slip structures of The Bohai Bay Basin and The Southwest Tarim Basin. The research revealed the Tan-Lu fault zones have significant influence on the structure evolution of The Bohai Bay Basin, also, the Kashgar-Yecheng transfer system in the foreland of West Kunlun Mountain is the important strike-slip regulating system for the Southwest Tarim Basin. A series of recent analogue experiments make us know more about the strike-slip structures. The thesis took The Bohai Bay Basin and The Southwest Tarim Basin as examples, to discuss the structure evolution under the strike-slip tectonic background. The major method of this theis was scaled physical modeling, which has been widely used to study the practical deformation of geological structures in the laboratory.The physical modeling result proved the NS-trending extensional and the strike-slip movements influence the tectonic evolution of The Bohai Bay Basin. The salients and depressions in this area show an alternate distribution. The Tan-Lu fault zones doesn’t extend straightly, it’s composed of segments in different strike directions. The difference of the angle between the strike direction and the stress lead to the various deformation width of the upper cap rock.The Kedong-Fudong structure belts have been impacted by the uplift of the western Kunlun mountain, its structure evolution has been impacted significantly by the uplift of the western Kunlun Mountain. Its deformation occurred mainly in Neogene to Quaternary. Seismic data show that this area developed thrust and imbricate faults in deep, and Cenozoic monoclines inclined to the north in shallow. In this research, we applied the scaled physical modeling to investigate the deformation process and mechanics of the Kedong-Fudong structure. Modeling results show that Kedong-Fudong structure is mainly controlled by compression from south to north, erosion process, and synkinematic sedimentation. Paleogene evaporate bed and Jurassic coal-series stratum work as regional composite detachment. They controlled the decoupling and differential evolution of upper and lower structures.