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Heat Flow and Thermal Structure of the Aegean Sea and the Southern Balkans

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Book cover Terrestrial Heat Flow and the Lithosphere Structure

Part of the book series: Exploration of the Deep Continental Crust ((EXPLORATION))

Abstract

Small-scale effects, either in time — a post-Miocene passive upwelling of the asthenosphere, following an extreme stretching of the lithosphere, or in space — a lithothermal system associated with an anomalous mantle in the central Aegean, have been proposed to account for the elevated heat flow in the Aegean. However, new evidence suggests that (1) high heat flow value areas cover the Aegean and the southern Balkans, a region much wider than previously thought, and are not confined to thin-crust areas; (2) heat flow values offshore are not correlated with Moho bathymetry; (3) heat flow was elevated in the wider region at least since Miocene, and no dramatic rise in its level at least since Pliocene is likely; (4) the post-Miocene stretching in the Aegean is much smaller than that indicated by Moho bathymetry; (5) high heat flow areas, deduced from measurements offshore and in boreholes, from hot springs, fumaroles and Plio-Quaternary volcanoes follow linear belts, some of which at least correlate with pre-Neogene and probably or possibly still active shear zones, but not with only recently activated fault zones; (6) a strong correlation between long-living magmatism and an anomalous, low-velocity mantle seems to exist. Ponding of magma along shear zones and lower crust attenuation in an environment of continental collision and escape may explain the history and geography of heat flow in the wider area of the Aegean and the southern Balkans.

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  1. Institute of Geology and Mineral Exploration (IGME), 70, Messoghion St., Athens, 11527, Greece

    S. C. Stiros

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  1. Geophysical Institute, Czechoslovakian Academy of Sciences, Boční II, čp. 1401, 14131, Praha, Czechoslovakia

    Vladimír Čermák

  2. Institute of Geophysics, ETH Hoenggerberg, 8093, Zürich, Switzerland

    Ladislaus Rybach

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Stiros, S.C. (1991). Heat Flow and Thermal Structure of the Aegean Sea and the Southern Balkans. In: Čermák, V., Rybach, L. (eds) Terrestrial Heat Flow and the Lithosphere Structure. Exploration of the Deep Continental Crust. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-75582-8_19

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