Tectonic Assessment of the Northwestern Nubian Shield at Southern Sinai, Egypt

Document Type : Original Article

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Geology Department, Faculty of Science, Port Said University, Egypt

Abstract

The Gulf of Suez is a relatively young continental rift, with its boundaries composed of the Arabian–Nubian Shield basement complex, which formed during the East African Orogeny. The precise effects and significance of the repeated tectonic activities on the Arabian–Nubian Shield, as well as their role in the rifting processes in the Gulf of Suez, are still not fully understood. However, the combination of zircon and apatite fission-track dating, alongside time–temperature modeling, has proven useful in investigating these processes. This study reviews thermochronological data derived from basement samples taken from the Wadis Ba’ba and Nesyrin regions, representing the northern end of the Gulf of Suez's eastern flank. These data represent cooling ages decreasing southward. The reconstructed time–temperature profiles indicated four significant episodes of rapid cooling, corresponding to the Neoproterozoic, Devonian–Carboniferous, Cretaceous, and Oligocene–Miocene periods. These cooling pulses were developed in response to four key tectonic events: (1) the post-accretion erosion event during the Precambrian–Cambrian, (2) the Devonian–Carboniferous Variscan tectonic event, (3) the Cretaceous break-up of Gondwana, and (4) the Oligocene–Miocene rifting of the Gulf of Suez.

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