• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.52 no.5
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• pp.449-457
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• 2019

We present the K-Ar age-dating results of the bulk and the less than $0.1{\mu}m$ fraction of the fault gouges collected from some major faults in the Gyeongsang basin. We try to determine the timings of fault activation based on the mineralogical characteristics, and to interpret the spatio-temporal variability of the major fault events during the Cenozoic Era by considering together with the previous results. We propose at least the 3-times of major fault events at about 50 Ma, and just after 30 Ma and 20 Ma in the Gyeongsang basin, which were inferred from the combined approach of the K-Ar ages and the clay mineralogy of the bulk fault gouges and the <$0.1{\mu}m$ fractions. The fault activation timings of the Yangsan fault tend to be younger in the northern part than in the southern part. In particular, the inferred fault events just after 30 Ma and 20 Ma are mainly detected in the Ocheon fault and the related faults, and the fault in the Gyeongju area. The fault activation timings of the major faults can be revised accurately by using illite-age-analysis(IAA) method. These geochronological determinations of the multiple events of the major faults in the Gyeongsang basin are crucial to establish the tectonic evolution in the southeastern part of the Korean Peninsula during the Cenozoic Era.

• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.36 no.1
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• pp.1-15
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• 2015

In order to outline the kinematics and movement history of a new Quaternary fault, Jingwan Fault in Dangjin, West Korea, we analyzed the geometry of the fault zone composed of a few gouge zones, and made ESR dating for fault gouge materials. The $N55^{\circ}E$ striking Jingwan Fault is a normal fault and exhibits a gradual change in dip (gentle in the lower part, steep in the upper part), indicating a listric fault. As for the fault gouge zone, its thickness varies and reaches 2~3 cm in the lower part or between basement rocks, and 20~30 cm in the middle-upper part or between the basement and Quaternary deposit. It is observed in the latter case that more than three gouge zones develop with different colors, and branch out and re-merge, or they are partly superimposed, indicating different movement episodes. The cumulative displacement is estimated to be about 10 m using the geological cross-sections, from which it is inferred that the total length of fault may be about 2.5 km on the basis of the empirical relation between cumulative displacement and fault length. Therefore, a more study would be needed to verify the entire fault length. The results of ESR dating for three gouge samples at different spots along the fault yields ages of $651{\pm}47$, $649{\pm}96$, and $436{\pm}66ka$, indicating at least two movement episodes. Slickenlines observed on the fault planes indicate a pure dip slip (normal faulting), which suggests that the ENE-WSW trending Jingwan Fault was presumably moved under a NNW-SSE extensional environment.

• The Journal of the Petrological Society of Korea
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.137-151
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• 2013

This study is focused on element behaviors and mineral compositions of the fault rock developed in Yongdang-ri, Yangbuk-myeon, Gyeongju City, Korea, using XRF, ICP, XRD, and EPMA/BSE in order to better understand the chemical variations in fault rocks during the fault activity, with emphasis on dependence of chemical mobility on mineralogy across the fault zone. As one of the main components of the fault rocks, $SiO_2$ shows the highest content which ranges from 61.6 to 71.0%, and $Al_2O_3$ is also high as having the 10.8~15.8% range. Alkali elements such as $Na_2O$ and $K_2O$ are in the range of 0.22~4.63% and 2.02~4.89%, respectively, and $Fe_2O_3$ is 3.80~12.5%, indicating that there are significant variations within the fault rock. Based on the chemical characteristics in the fault rocks, it is evident that the fault gouge zone is depleted in $Na_2O$, $Al_2O_3$, $K_2O$, $SiO_2$, CaO, Ba and Sr, whereas enriched in $Fe_2O_3$, MgO, MnO, Zr, Hf and Rb relative to the fault breccia zone. Such chemical behaviors are closely related to the difference in the mineral compositions between breccia and gouge zones because the breccia zone consists of the rock-forming minerals including quartz and feldspar, whereas the gouge zone consists of abundant clay minerals such as illite and chlorite. The alteration of the primary minerals leading to the formation of the clay minerals in the fault zone was affected by the hydrothermal fluids involved in fault activity. Taking into account the fact that major, trace and rare earth elements were leached out from the precursor minerals, it is assumed that the element mobility was high during the first stage of the fault activity because the fracture zone is interpreted to have acted as a path of hydrothermal fluids. Moving toward the later stage of fault activity, the center of the fracture zone was transformed into the gouge zone during which the permeability in the fault zone gradually decreased with the formation of clay minerals. Consequently, elements were effectively constrained in the gouge zone mostly filled with authigenic minerals including clay minerals, characterized by the low element mobility.

• Journal of the Mineralogical Society of Korea
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• v.27 no.4
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• pp.301-310
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• 2014

To investigate the role of fault gauge in the behavior of heavy metals caused by the acid rock drainage in the area of pyrite-rich andesite, XRD, pH measurement, XRF, SEM-EDS, ICP, and sequential extraction method were used. Bed rock consists of quartz, pyrophyllite, pyrite, illite, and topaz, but the brown-colored fault gouge is composed of quartz, illite, chlorite, smectite, goethite, and cacoxenite. The mineral composition of bed rock suggests that it is heavily altered by hydrothermal activity. The concentrations of heavy metals in the bed rock are as follows, Zn > As > Cu > Pb > Cr > Ni > Cd, and those in fault gouge are As > Zn > Pb > Cr > Cu > Ni > Cd. The concentrations of the heavy metals in the fault gouge are generally higher than those in the bed rock, especially for Pb, As, and Cr, which were more than twice as those in the bed rock. It is believed that the difference in the amount of heavy metals between the bed rock and the fault gouge is mainly due to the existence of goethite which is the main mineral composition in the fault gouge and can play important role in sequestering these metals by coprecipitation and adsorption. The low pH, caused by oxidation of pyrite, also plays significant role in fixation of those metals. It is confirmed that the fractions of labile (step 1) and acid-soluble (step 2), which can be easily released into the environment, were higher in the bed rock. Those fractions were relatively low in fault gauge, suggesting that fault gauge can play important role as a sink of heavy metals to prevent those ones from being released in the area where the acid rock drainage can have an influence.

• Journal of the Mineralogical Society of Korea
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• v.32 no.3
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• pp.201-211
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• 2019

The particle size and crystallinity of fault gouge generally decreases with slip. Phyllosilicates including talc are known to be present in fault gouge and play an important role in fault weakening. In particular, the coefficient of friction varies depending on the presence of a water molecule on the surface of mineral. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of talc on fault weakening by changing the water content and dehydration behavior of talc before and after grinding, which systematically varied particle size and crystallinity using high energy ball mill. Infrared spectroscopy and thermal analysis show that the as-received talc is hydrophobic before grinding and the water molecule is rarely present. After grinding up to 720 minutes, the particle size decreased to around 100 ~300 nm, and in talc, where amorphization proceeded, the water content increased by about 8 wt.% and water molecule would be attached on the surface of talc. As a result, the amount of vaporized water by heating increased after grinding. The dihydroxylation temperature also decreased by ${\sim}750^{\circ}C$ after 720 minutes of grinding at ${\sim}950^{\circ}C$ before grinding due to the decrease of particle size and crystallinity. These results indicate that the hydrophobicity of talc is changed to hydrophilic by grinding, and water molecules attached on the surface, which is thought to lower the coefficient of friction of phyllosilicates. The repeated slip throughout the seismic cycle would consistently lower the coefficient of friction of talc present in fault gouge, which could provide the clue to the weakening of matured fault.

• Journal of the Mineralogical Society of Korea
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.85-94
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• 2002

XRF, XRD, EPMA have been used to investigate microstructures and mineralogical changes caused by the faulting and fluids associated with faulting in the Quaternary fault gouge zones at the Sangchon, Ipsil and Wangsan faults located at the southeastern part of the Korean Peninsula. The chemical compositions of faulted rocks and protoliths analyzed by XRF show that the fault gouges are relatively enriched in TiO$_2$, P$_2$O$_{5}$, MgO, and Fe$_2$O$_3$) compared with protoliths, indicating that the fluids associated with faulting were highly activated. XRD results show that the fault gouges predominantly consist of quartz, feldspar, calcite and clay minerals. Clay minerals formed in the gouge zones are mainly composed of smectite characterized by a dioctahedral sheet. Based on EPMA analyses various kinds of sulfide, carbonate, phosphate minerals were identified in the gouge zones and protoliths. Xenotime of grey fault gouge of the Sangchon fault and sulfide minerals of contact andesitic rock of Ipsil fault and contact grey andesitic rock of Wangsan fault were probably formed by inflow of hydrothermal solution associated with faulting prior to the Quaternary. Carbonate minerals of contact andesitic rock and gouge zone of the Ipsil fault were formed by inflow of fluid associated with faulting prior to the Quaternary. They are heavily fractured and have reaction rim on their edge, indicating that faultings and inflow of fluids were highly activated after carbonate minerals were formed. Calcites of Wangsan fault seemed to be formed in syntectonic or posttectonic Quaternary faulting.g.

• The Journal of Engineering Geology
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.187-196
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• 2016

We conducted three-dimensional finite element analysis to predict the presence of upcoming fault zones during tunneling. The analysis considered longitudinal displacements measured at tunnel face, and used 28 numerical models with various fault attitudes. The x-MR (moving range) control chart was used to analyze quantitatively the effects of faults distributed ahead of the tunnel face, given the occurrence of a longitudinal displacement. The numerical models with fault were classified as fault gouge, fault breccia, and fault damage zones. The width of fault cores was set to 1 m (fault gouge 0.5 m and fault breccia 0.5 m) and the width of fault damage zones was set to 2 m. The results, suggest that fault centers could be predicted at 2~26 m ahead of the tunnel face and that faults could be predicted earliest in the 45° dip model. In addition, faults could be predicted earliest when the angle between the direction of tunnel advance and the strike of the fault was smallest.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.34 no.6
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• pp.583-593
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• 2001

Clay minerals are common component of fault gouge and have been used to determine the fault activity age using K-Ar dating technique. We carried out XRD and K-Ar analyses of the mica clay minerals from the fault gouge along the Ulsan Fault Zone, southeastern Korea to estimate the timing of the major fault activity. Mica clay minerals for four grain size fractions of 5-2 Um, 2-1 $\mu$m, 1-0.35$\mu$m, and 0.35-0.05 $\mu$m were separated from the gouge samples in the three locations by the hydraulic elutriation and contrifugal separator. Fault gouges are composed of smectite, mica clay minerals, kaolinite, chlorite, quartz, and feldspar. The illite crystallinity of mica clay minerals is the highest in the finest grained fraction with lM polytype, indicating that the aulhigenic mica clay minerals have been concentrated in the fraction. K-Ar ages give some variation from 46 to 35 Ma (330-2), 45 to 39 Ma (16Ww), and 32 to 15 Ma (102Ws) and are the youngest in the finest grained fraction. These results suggest that the hydrothermal alteration associated with the major fault activities along the Ulsan fault Zone took place twice at 39-35 Ma and 15 Ma.

• Journal of the Mineralogical Society of Korea
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• v.22 no.1
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• pp.13-22
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• 2009

The study area is a tunnelling section passing through the Yangsan Fault zone. Kyungbu express highway and national road 35 are located above the tunnel. Previous study showed that fault gouge and fault breccia were widely distributed in the tunnelling section with a maximum width of 100 m. From the present study, it is found that sedimentary rocks consisting mainly of shale are distributed at the eastern block of the Yangsan Fault and these rocks are not subject to mechanical fracturing and hydrothermal alteration. On the other hand, dacitic tuff distributed at the western block of the Yangsan Fault is largely affected by mechanical fracturing and hydrothermal alteration. The large fault zone of $50{\sim}130m$ width was formed by complex processes of mechanical fracturing and hydrothermal alterations such as chloritization, sericitization, and kaolinization. Based on the characteristics of mechanical fracturing and hydrothermal alterations, the Yangsan fault zone in the study area is geotechnically classified as four zones: unaltered zone, altered zone, altered fractured zone, and fault gouge zone. These zones show different degrees and aspects in mechanical fracturing and hydrothermal alterations, resulting in different engineering properties.

• The Journal of the Petrological Society of Korea
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.211-230
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• 2016

Detailed mapping along the Keumwang fault reveals a complex history of multiple brittle reactivations following late Jurassic and early Cretaceous ductile shearing. The fault core consists of a 10~50 m thick fault gouge layer bounded by a 30~100 m thick damaged zone. The Pre-cambrian gneiss and Jurassic granite underwent at least six distinct stages of fault movements based on deformation environment, time and mechanism. Each stage characterized by fault kinematics and dynamics at different deformation environment. Stage 1 generated mylonite series along the Keumwang shear zone by sinistral ductile shearing during late Jurassic and early Cretaceous. Stage 2 was a mostly brittle event generating cataclasite series superimposed on the mylonite series of the Keumwang shear zone. The roundness of pophyroclastes and the amount of matrix increase from host rocks to ultracataclasite indicating stronger cataclastic flow toward the fault core. At stage 3, fault gouge layer superimposed on the cataclasite generated during stage 2 and the sedimentary basins (Umsung and Pungam) formed along the fault by sinistral strike-slip movement. Fragments of older cataclasite suspended in the fault gouge suggest extensive reworking of fault rocks at brittle deformation environments. At stage 4, systematic en-echelon folds, joints and faults were formed in the sedimentary basins by sinistral strike-slip reactivation of the Keumwang fault. Most of the shearing is accommodated by slip along foliations and on discrete shear surfaces, while shear deformation tends to be relatively uniformly distributed within the fault damage zone developed in the mudrocks in the sedimentary basins. Fine-grained andesitic rocks intruded during stage 4. Stage 5 dextral strike-slip activity produced shear planes and bands in the andesitic rocks. ESR(Electron Spin Resonance) dates of fault gouge show temporal clustering within active period and migrating along the strike of the Keumwang fault during the stage 6 at the Quaternary period.