• Journal of the Korean Geophysical Society
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• v.2 no.3
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• pp.179-190
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• 1999

The overall structural framework was studied using the regional 2D seismic data, followed by the sequence stratigraphic study on the 3D seismic and well- log data in the margin of the South Con Son basin of the South China Sea. This research contributes to delineate depositional stratigraphy, depositional environment and geologic history in the 3D seismic area of highly complicated faulting. Eight Miocene sequences were indicated on the 3D seismic and well-log data, in which the structural maps of each sequence boundary and the isochron maps for the corresponding sequence were made. The seismic facies were analyzed for each sequence volume and sequence boundary surface. The 3D seismic area is characterized by coal beds deposited in the transgression environment (transgression systems tract) and channel distributions just above the sequence boundaries. During the Early Miocene, the coals and thick shales deposited in the mangrove swamp representing the lower coastal plain environment. During the Mid to Late Miocene, thick clastic sediments deposited in the coastal to shallow shelf by regional subsidence and marine transgression. The isochron maps and structural patterns indicate that the sediments were transported from west to east or from northwest to southeast.

• The Journal of the Petrological Society of Korea
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.1-15
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• 2008

The metasedimentary rocks of the Nampo Croup consisting of metaconglomerates, metasandstones, phyllites are exposed in the area of the Daechcon beach and Maryangri, Seocheon-gun. Their typical metamorphic assemblages of Bt-Mus-Grt-Qtz (${\pm}Pl{\pm}Chl$) and Bt-Mus-Qtz (${\pm}Pl{\pm}Chl$) indicate that they have been under intermediate P/T type metamorphism and were metamorphosed to garnet zone grade of amphibolite-facies during the Daebo Orogeny. Pressure-temperature conditions of peak metamorphism estimated from geothermobarometries are $560{\sim}595^{\circ}C$, $6.9{\sim}8.2\;kb$ respectively. The results of K-Ar biotite age determination are $143.2{\pm}3.6\;Ma$, $122.6{\pm}2.4\;Ma$ and $124.8{\pm}2.4\;Ma$ and the last two ages are considered as the results of later-stage thermal perturbation. On the bases of the formation age of Daedong Supergroup of $187{\sim}172\;Ma$ (Han et al., 2006; Jeon et al., 2007) combined with the results of this study, the hypothetical model of tectonometamorphic evolution of the study area during Daebo Orogeny is proposed. Crustal thickening resulted from folding and duplexing of thrusts in the area initiated at around 175 Ma just after sedimentation of Nampo Croup. And then rapid cooling by normal faulting due to crustal extention followed immediately after the peak metamorphism to the closure temperature of biotite.

• The Journal of the Petrological Society of Korea
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.1-15
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• 2014

The Yeongam mineralized zone is located in the southwestern part of the Korean peninsula, including the Sangeun, Eunjeok and Baramjai mines. This zone is located in the northeastern part of the Mokpo-Haenam-Yeongam volcanic circular structure. The 13 sites of quartz vein with mineralization are developed in the Sangeun-Eunjeok-Baramjai area, within rhyolitic welded tuff, showing N-S or NNW trend with highly dipping to the west. The quartz veins occur as a single vein or a bundle of veins with width of 1-5 cm in each. The existence of faults parallel to the quartz veins indicates that the faulting occurred before and after the development of quartz veins and mineralization. The quartz veins and mineralized zone are displaced by NW-trending sinistral strike-slip faults. The extension of the Sangeun-Eunjeok mineralized belt is traced to the south, following a NNW-trending tectonic line, and the Au-Ag contents are analysed in the 12 sites of quartz veins. Contents of gold and silver are 12.3 g/t and 1,380.0 g/t in Eunjeok mine, 2.7 g/t, 23.5g in Sangeun mine, and <0.1 g/t, 5.7 g/t in Baramjai mine respectively. Therefore, a highly Ag-Au mineralized zone is not developed in the southern part of the studied area.

• 한국지구물리탐사학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2002.09a
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• pp.46-66
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• 2002

High-resolution multichannel seismic data were collected in the coastal area near the Gori nuclear power plant to investigate Quaternary fault pattern and timing. A 12 channel streamer, a sparker, and a portable recorder were used for data acquisition. Because the group interval of the streamer was 6.25 m and the sparker can generate acoustic waves with the frequency content of up to 500 Hz, the data show a significant improvement both in horizontal and vertical resolution. The area surveyed is covered with 30-40 m thick Holocene sediments that constitute the mud belt along the southeastern coast of Korea. The survey area is characterized by the well discriminated Pleistocene and Holocene boundary and shallow gas-charged zones. A number of Quaternary faults were found in the sediment column, that are nearly vertical and extend north-south. The Quaternary faults, arranged at a spacing of a few hundred meters, suggest that they were formed in response to compression, although some of them reveal extensional characteristics. Locally, faults disrupt Incised-channel fills that are interpreted to have formed in the early stage of transgression after the beginning of the Holocene. Seismic sections suggest that shallow gas in the mud belt sediments made its way upward through the fractured fault planes. The tectonism responsible for the opening of the East Sea has not persisted since the late Miocene, but vigorous Quaternary faulting activity in the vicinity of the southeastern Korean Peninsula indicates that tectonic stability has yet to be achieved in this region underlain by the hotter than normal mantle.

• The Journal of Engineering Geology
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.145-152
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• 2008

A fault gouge zone which is about 25cm thick crops out along a small valley in Yangbuk-myeon, Gyeongju city. It is divided into greenish brown gouge and bluish gray gouge by color. Under the microscope, the gouges have a lot of porphyroclasts composed of old gouge fragments, quartz, feldspar and iron minerals. Clay minerals are abundant in matrix, defining strikingly P foliation by preferred orientation. Microstructural differences between bluish pay gouge and greenish brown gouge are as follows: greenish brown gouge compared to bluish gray gouge is (1) rich in clay minerals, (2) small in size and number of porphyroclasts, and (3) plentiful in iron minerals which are mostly hematites, while chiefly pyrites in bluish gray gouge. Hematites are considered to be altered from pyrites in the early-formed greenish brown gouge under the influence of hydrothermal fluids accompanied during the formation of bluish gray gouge that also precipitated pyrites. It is believed that the fault core including bluish gray gouge zone and greenish brown gouge zone was formed by progressive cataclastic flow. In the first stage the fault core initiates from damage zone of early faulting. In the second stage damage zone actively transforms into breccia zone by repeated fracturing. The third stage includes greenish brown (old) gouge formation in the center of the fault core mainly by particle grinding. In the third stage further deformation leads to the formation of new (bluish gray) gouge zone while old gouge zone undergoes strain hardening. Consequently, the whole gouge zone in the core widens.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.49 no.1
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• pp.43-52
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• 2016

The essential role of the Division of Earth Sciences(EAR) in the Directorate of Geoscience(GEO) of National Science Foundation of America(NSF) is to support basic research aimed at acquiring fundamental knowledge of the Earth system that can be directly applied to the United States' strategic needs. The 2011 Committee on New Research Opportunities in the Earth Sciences(NROES) of the National Academy of Sciences(NAS) identified specific areas of the basic earth science research scope of the EAR that were poised for rapid progress during the next decade. Quantified by interdisciplinary approaches, the Committee highlighted the following topics relating to the EAR Deep Earth Processes and Surface Earth Processes sections: (1) the early Earth; (2) thermochemical internal dynamics and volatile distribution; (3) faulting and deformation processes; (4) interactions among climate, the Earth surface processes, tectonics, and deep Earth processes; (5) co-evolution of life, environment, and climate; (6) coupled hydrogeomorphic-ecosystem response to natural and anthropogenic change; and (7) interactions of biogeochemical and water cycles in terrestrial environments. We also promote future research challenges such as the critical zone studies. In order to promote more active such a huge future research challenges, additional research support policies are needed.

• Geophysics and Geophysical Exploration
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.137-143
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• 2010

An earthquake with local magnitude $(M_L)$ 3.7 on December 9, 2000 occurred offshore Yeongdeok area, South Korea. In case of applying Chang and Baag (2006) crustal velocity model, the epicenter is $36.4462^{\circ}N\;and\;129.9789^{\circ}E$, which belongs to the inside of the Korean Peninsula Continental Shelf. Although we use the modified model reducing crustal thickness of Chang and Baag (2006) model by 5 km considering the transition from continental crust to oceanic crust in the East Sea, the epicenter was little changed. We carried out the waveform inversion analysis to estimate focal depth and focal mechanism of this event. The focal depth is estimated to be 11 ~ 12 km. The seismic moment is estimated to be $1.0{\times}10^{15}N{\cdot}m$, and this value corresponds to the moment magnitude $(M_W)$ 3.9. The offshore Yeongdeok event including May 29, 2004 offshore Uljin one show typical thrust faulting, and the direction of P-axis is ESE-WNW. The moment magnitude estimated by the spectral analysis is 4.0, which is similar to that by the waveform inversion analysis. Average stress drop is estimated to be 3.4 MPa.

• Journal of the Korean Geophysical Society
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.189-197
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• 2006

The Korea Plateau is a continental fragment rifted and partially segmented from the Korean Peninsulaat the initial stage of the opening of the East Sea (Japan Sea). We interpreted marine seismic profiles from the South Korea Plateau in conjunction with swath bathymetric to investigate processes of con-tjnental rifting and separation of the southwestern Japan Arc. The SouU-i Korea Plateau preserves funda-mental elements of rift architecture comprising a seaward succession of a rift basin and an uplifted rift flank passing into the slope, typical of a passive continental margin. Two distinguished rift basins (Onnuri and Bandal Basins) in the South Korea Plateau are bounded by major synthetic and smaller antithetic faults, creating wide and symmetric profiles. The large-offset border fault zones of these basins have convex dip slopes and demonstrate a zig-zag arrangement along strike. Rifting was primarily controlled by normal faulting resulting from extension orthogonal to the inferred line of breakup along the base ofthe slope rather U-ian strike-slip deformation. Two extension direcdons for rifdng are recog-nized; U-ie Onnuri Basin was rifted in U-ie EW direction; U-ie Bandal Basin in U-ie EW and NW-SE directions, suggesting two rift stages. We interpret that the E-W direction represents initial rifting at the inner margin; while the Japan Basin widened, rifting propagated repeatedly from the Japan Basin to the southeast toward the Korean margin but could not penetrate the strong continental lithosphere of the Korean Shield and changed direction to the south, resulting in E-W extension to create the rift basins at the Korean margin. The Hupo Basin to the south of the Korea Plateau is estimated to have formed in this process. The NW-SE direction probably represents the direction of rifting orthogonal to the inferred line of breakup along the base of the slope of the South Korea Plateau; after breakup the southwestern Japan Arc separated in the SE direction, indicating a response to tensional tectonics associated with the subduction of the Pacific Plate in the NE direction. We suggest that structural evolution of the eastern Korean margin can be explained by the processes occurring at the passive continental margin.

• The Journal of Engineering Geology
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• v.28 no.4
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• pp.645-660
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• 2018

In the southeastern part of the Korean Peninsula, huge fault valleys, including the Yangsan and Ulsan faults, are recognized. These NNE-SSW trending lineaments are called as a whole Yangsan Fault System. However, this fault system is relatively poorly studied except the Yangsan and Ulsan faults. This study deduced the paleostress history based on the mutual cross-cutting relationships between geologic structures developed in the granite body near the Ilgwang fault, which is compared with previous studies. In the study area, four lineaments parallel to the Ilgwang fault are recognized, and three of them show evidences of faulting. In each lineament, both slip-senses of left-lateral and right-lateral are recognized. It indicates that these faults consistently underwent multiple deformations of inversion along the faults. The inferred paleostress directions based on the mutual cross-cutting relationships of the geological structures are as follows: 1) Tensile fractures developed in the late Cretaceous under the ENE-WSW direction of compressive stress, 2) NW-SE trending maximum horizontal principal stress generated conjugate strike-slip faults, and 3) selective reactivations of some structures were derived under the compression by the NE-SW trending principal stress.

• The Journal of Engineering Geology
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.509-515
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• 2009

Three earthquakes with local magnitude ($M_L$) greater than 3.0 occurred on April 24, June 2 and September 12 in 1999 nearby the Gyeongju area. Redetermined epicenters were located within the radius of 1 km. We carried out waveform inversion analysis to estimate focal mechanism of June 2 event, and P and S wave polarity and their amplitude ratio analysis to estimate focal mechanisms of April 24 and September 12 events. June 2 and September 12 events had similar fault plane solutions each other. The fault plane solution of April 24 event included those of other 2 events, but its distribution range was relatively broad. Focal mechanisms of those events had a strike slip faulting with a small normal component. P-axes of those events were ENE-WSW which were similar to previous studies on the P-axis of the Korean Peninsula. Considering distances between epicenters, similarities of seismic waves and sameness of polarities of seismic data recorded at common seismic stations, these events might occurred at the same fault. The seismic moment of June 2 event was estimated to be $3.9\;{\times}\;10^{14}\;N{\cdot}m$ and this value corresponded to the moment magnitude ($M_W$) 3.7. The moment magnitude estimated by spectral analysis was 3.8, which was similar to that estimated by waveform inversion analysis. The average stress drop was estimated to be 7.5 MPa. Moment magnitudes of April 24 and September 12 events were estimated to be 3.2 and 3.4 by comparing the spectrum of those events recorded at common single seismic station.