‘A Geotraverse across the Caledonian Thrust Sheets of Northern Scotland – implications for regional tectonic models’ – Professor Rob Strachan of Portsmouth University.
The talk will present a traverse across the best exposed cross-section through the east-dipping Caledonian thrust sheets of northern Scotland. We will start in the west at Faraid Head, Durness and Loch Eriboll in well known exposures of the Moine Thrust Zone and then progress east and structurally upwards into the lesser well known Moine rocks with inliers of Archaean basement. These exposures include garnet grade metasedimentary rocks and metagabbro intrusions around the Kyle of Tongue in the Moine Nappe, and the overlying migmatitic paragneisses of the Naver Nappe between Torrisdale Bay and Kirtomy.
Further east are the enigmatic gneisses of the Strathy Complex, the tectonic setting of which has been the subject of recent reinterpretation. An important aim is to show how the integration of geochronology and field geology helps to build up regional tectonic models for the evolution of northern Scotland in Neoproterozoic to Lower Palaeozoic times.
Bio
Rob Strachan studied for his BSc Honours degree at the University College of Wales Aberystwyth, where his mapping project carried out on the Ross of Mull sparked his interest in the metamorphic rocks of the Scottish Caledonides. He then went to the University of Keele to carry out his PhD studies on the Moine rocks of the Loch Eil area in West Inverness-shire. His teaching career started at Oxford Brookes University, he later moved to the University of Portsmouth where he is Professor of Geology.
Over the years he has authored many academic papers on the Scottish Caledonides and either collaboratively or single-handedly has been involved in the remapping of nine BGS 1:50,000 scale geology maps in Sutherland and Ross-shire. He is co-editor of the forthcoming 5 th edition of “The Geology of Scotland”.
You can register for the talk using the link below
https://zoom.us/meeting/register/tJckc-2tpjsuG9V6YDqiX5OzweGAw_C3NKm1#/registration
