Deep India meets deep Asia: Lithospheric indentation, delamination and break-off under Pamir and Hindu Kush (Central Asia)

Abstract

Subduction of buoyant continental lithosphere is one of the least understood plate-tectonic processes. Yet under the Pamir–Hindu Kush, at the northwestern margin of the India–Asia collision zone, unusual deep earthquakes and seismic velocity anomalies suggest subduction of Asian and Indian lithosphere. Here, we report new precise earthquake hypocenters, detailed tomographic images and earthquake source mechanisms, which allow distinguishing a narrow sliver of Indian lithosphere beneath the deepest Hindu Kush earthquakes and a broad, arcuate slab of Asian lithosphere beneath the Pamir. We suggest that this double subduction zone arises by contrasting modes of convergence under the Pamir and Hindu Kush, imposed by the different mechanical properties of the three types of lithosphere involved. While the buoyant northwestern salient of Cratonic India bulldozes into Cratonic Asia, forcing delamination and rollback of its lithosphere, India’s thinned western continental margin separates from Cratonic India and subducts beneath Asia. This torn-off narrow plate sliver forms a prominent high-velocity anomaly down to the mantle transition zone. Our images show that its uppermost section is thinned or already severed and that intermediate depth earthquakes cluster at the neck connecting it to the deeper slab, providing a rare glimpse at the ephemeral process of slab break-off.