This book is a systematic guide to the recognition and interpretation of deformation microstructures and mechanisms in minerals and rocks at the scale of a thin section. Diagnostic features of microstructures and mechanisms are emphasized, and the subject is extensively illustrated with high-quality color and black and white photomicrographs, and many clear diagrams. After introducing three main classes of deformation microstructures and mechanisms, low- to high-grade deformation is presented in a logical sequence in Chapters 2 to 5. Magmatic/submagmatic deformation, shear sense indicators, and shock microstructures and metamorphism are described in Chapters 6 to 8, which are innovative chapters in a structural geology textbook. The final chapter shows how deformation microstructures and mechanisms can be used quantitatively to understand the behavior of the earth. Recent experimental research on failure criteria, frictional sliding laws, and flow laws is summarized in tables, and palaeopiezometry is discussed. Audience: This book is essential to all practising structural and tectonic geologists who use thin sections, and is an invaluable research tool for advanced undergraduates, postgraduates, lecturers and researchers in structural geology and tectonics.

Study of microstructures is an indispensable component of understanding structural geology of any terrain. A number of ‘new’ microscopic structures such as ‘flanking microstructures’, trapezoid-shaped mineral grains, reversal of ductile shear sense, micro-duplexes, V-pull aparts, and new minerals nucleating inside host minerals have recently been described in individual manuscripts. However, for the sake of brevity, microstructural papers cannot show all possible variation in their morphology. The proposed book aims to present these structures with attractive colour photographs. Each photomicrograph will have a comprehensive caption. The book also presents grain boundary migration, boudins, symptoms of metamorphic retrogression, and how well known shear sense indicators (S-C fabrics, mineral fish etc.) vary in morphology in serial-sections. The target audience is for graduate and postgraduate geosciences students and researchers of structural geology.

This book is a systematic guide to the recognition and interpretation of deformation microstructures and mechanisms in minerals and rocks at the scale of a thin section. Diagnostic features of microstructures and mechanisms are emphasized, and the subject is extensively illustrated with high-quality color and black and white photomicrographs, and many clear diagrams. After introducing three main classes of deformation microstructures and mechanisms, low- to high-grade deformation is presented in a logical sequence in Chapters 2 to 5. Magmatic/submagmatic deformation, shear sense indicators, and shock microstructures and metamorphism are described in Chapters 6 to 8, which are innovative chapters in a structural geology textbook. The final chapter shows how deformation microstructures and mechanisms can be used quantitatively to understand the behavior of the earth. Recent experimental research on failure criteria, frictional sliding laws, and flow laws is summarized in tables, and palaeopiezometry is discussed. Audience: This book is essential to all practising structural and tectonic geologists who use thin sections, and is an invaluable research tool for advanced undergraduates, postgraduates, lecturers and researchers in structural geology and tectonics.

This book consists of 18 papers on deformation mechanisms, rheology and tectonics. The main approaches include experimental rock deformation, microstructural analysis, field structural studies, analogue and numerical modelling. New results on various topics are presented, ranging from brittle to ductile deformation and grain-scale to lithospherescale mechanisms. The volume contains review papers on several major current topics, such as the rheology of the lithospheric mantle and the mechanisms of exhumation of high-pressure tectonic units, as well as research papers on kinematic and mechanical analysis of rock deformation and related new techniques. Several contributions emphasize the increasing ability and wish of researchers to strengthen the links between small-scale physical mechanisms and large-scale tectonics. The volume will be of interest to academic and industrial researchers in the fields of structural geology, interactions between metamorphism, fluids and deformation, and large-scale tectonic processes.

This collection of papers presents recent advances in the study of deformation mechanisms and rheology and their applications to tectonics. Many of the contributions exploit new petrofabric techniques, particularly electron backscatter diffraction, to help understand the evolution of rock microstructure and mechanical properties. Papers in the first section (lattice preferred orientations and anisotropy ) show a growing emphasis on the determination of elastic properties from petrofabrics, from which acoustic properties can be computed for comparison with in-situ seismic measurements. Such research will underpin geodynamic interpretation of large-scale active tectonics. Contributions in the second section (microstructures, mechanisms and rheology) study the relations between microstructural evolution during deformation and mechanical properties.

Microtectonics is the interpretation of small-scale deformation structures in rocks. They are studied by optical microscope and contain abundant information on the history and type of deformation and metamorphism in a rock and are therefore used by most geologists to obtain data for large-scale geological interpretations. This advanced textbook contains a large number of photographs and explanatory drawings, special chapters on related techniques, a chapter on microgauges and a simple, non-mathematical treatment of continuum mechanics with practical examples. Special terms are explained in boxes. This textbook is suited for independent use during optical studies on microstructures as a reference manual and as a manual for short courses.