Intro. Field Workshop "High-pressure belts of Central Guatemala: The Motagua Suture and the Chuacús Complex"

Intro

One of the greatest examples of ancient subduction in the Caribbean is the Motagua suture of Central Guatemala, which was selected as the first locality for IGCP project 546. We will conduct a series of scientific and educational activities in Guatemala between the 28th of November and the 9th of December of 2007. The activities include an international field trip to the Motagua suture zone of Guatemala open to researchers, students and interested people throughout the world, an international conference on Caribbean subduction zones, and a shortcourse on tectonics and geologic hazards for undergraduates at Guatemala’s National San Carlos University.

In arranging this educational and scientific activities, we have worked along with Dr. Alfredo Galvez from Guatemala’s Ministry of Mining and Energy, who co-organized the event. He facilitated, not only did the Ministry’s logisitic support, but actually getting funds which partially covered the cost of organized activities. We also would like to thank our colleagues of the Geology Department of San Carlos University in CUNOR (particularly Luis Chiquín and Axel Gutiérrez), and colleagues of the Geological Society of Guatemala (especially Byron Mota) for helping to organize and promote the educational and scientific events.

Abridged Schedule

The event shall take place during December 03-09 2007. We shall visit a number of key-localities including the Motagua suture and the Chuacús complex and try to answer to the question: One or several subductions zones? Workshop (1 day) to be held at the Ministry of Mining and Energy. Short course for local earth science students to be held at the Geology Department of Centro Universitario del Norte.

Monday, Dec 3. Short course for Central American undergraduate students on tectonic and petrologic aspects of Caribbean plate-margin interactions (In Spanish). Departamento de Geología, Centro Universitario del Norte.
Leaders:
    Manuel Iturralde, Uwe Martens and Antonio García Casco

Tuesday, Dec 4. Visit to Carrizal Grande lawsonite eclogite. This trip involves a very hard hike. Availability is limited. Participation is by request. Overnight in Guatemala City.
Leaders:
    Tatsuki Tsujimori, George Harlow and John Cleary

Wednesday, Dec 5. Workshop "Caribbean Subduction Zones – Past and Present" in Guatemala City. Organized by Ministerio de Energía y Minas. Overnight Guatemala City.

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More details

Thursday, Dec 6. Subinal Formation on CA-9, Motagua fault in Cabañas, southern mélange on road to San Diego, and Las Ovejas complex south of Huité. Overnight, Hotel Pasabien near Teculután.
Leaders:
    Axel Gutiérrez (Subinal)
    Uwe Martens (+ to be defined) (Motagua fault in Cabañas)
    Jinny Sisson and George Harlow (Carretera Cabañas - San Diego)
    Rafael Torres de León and Luigi Solari (Ovejas complex)

Friday, Dec 7. Chuacús complex in the Sierra de las Minas in Pasabien, eclogites and northern mélange on CA-14, jade locality, Baja Verapaz peridotite in Purulhá. Overnight, Salamá, Baja Verapaz.
Leaders:
    Uwe Martens and Mauricio Chiquín (Chuacús Pasabien)
    Uwe Martens (Baja Verapaz Peridotite)
    George Harlow (northern Mélange and jade)

Saturday, Dec 8. Santa Rosa Group, Salamás/San Gabriel sequence, and Baja Verapaz shear zone in Rabinal; high-pressure gneisses El Chol, eclogites in gneiss Agua Caliente, blueschist and eclogite in Belejeyá. Overnight El Chol-Granados-Pachalum area, or Guatemala City.
Leaders:
    Carlos Ortega-Obregón and Fernando Ortega-Gutiérrez (Metasediments of Rabinal and Baja Verapaz shear zone)
    Luigi Solari and Uwe Martens (Chuacús El Chol)
    Uwe Martens and Fernando Ortega-Gutiérrez (Chuacús Agua Caliente)
    George Harlow, Tatsuki Tsujimori and Hannes Bruckner (Belejeyá eclogites and blueschists).

Sunday Dec 9. Visit to Mixco Viejo archeological site. Mayan city built with blocks of serpentinite and metamorphic rocks from the Chuacús Complex.

Field trip leaders

Axel Gutiérrez - Universidad de San Carlos, Guatemala, cobanero_a@yahoo.es

Carlos Ortega-Obregón - Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, carloo45@gmail.com

Fernando Ortega Gutiérrez – Departamento de Geología Regional, Instituto de Geología, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, fortega@servidor.unam.mx

George Harlow –Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Division of Physical Sciences, American Museum of Natural History, New York, gharlow@amnh.org

Hannes Bruckner - Queens College CUNY & Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, USA, hannes@ldeo.columbia.edu

Virginia Sisson – American Museum of Natural History, j_sisson@netzero.net

John Cleary - Ventana Mining Co. USA, jgcleary@pyramid.net

Luigi Solari - Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, solari@servidor.unam.mx

Mauricio Chiquín - Guatemala. mchiquin@gmail.com

Rafael Torres de León - Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, torresdeleonr@yahoo.com.mx

Tatsuki Tsujimori - The Pheasant Memorial Laboratory for Geochemistry and Cosmochemistry, Institute for Study of the Earth's Interior, Okayama University, Japan, tatsukix@misasa.okayama-u.ac.jp

Uwe Martens - Department of Geological & Environmental Sciences, Stanford University, umartens@stanford.edu

Workshop

The Workshop "High-pressure belts of Central Guatemala: The Motagua Suture and the Chuacús Complex" will take place on Wednesday, December 5, in Guatemala City.

President

Alfredo Galvez, General Director of Mining, Ministry for Mining and Energy, Guatemala,  dirmineria@mem.gob.gt

Conveners

Uwe Martens, Department of Geological & Environmental Sciences, Stanford University, umartens@stanford.edu

Antonio García Casco, Departmento de Mineralogía y Petrología, Universidad de Granada, agcasco@ugr.es

Contents

There will be 3 types of presentations:

A) Opening and closure invited keynote talks. 30 min. The conveners will select 2 talks from the submitted abstracts based on relevance and/or broad coverage of issues concerning subduction in the Caribbean area and, and in particular, in Guatemala and adjoining areas.

B) Long talks. 15+5 min will be given to talks that are relevant to the field localities (or adjacent areas) that will be visited in the Guatemala field trip.

C) Short talks. 8+2 min. These talks should cover problems concerning subduction in any other region of the Caribbean area. We encourage authors to include a brief statement on how their field areas may correlate with convergent margins in the Guatemalan region. Our goal is to start a discussion on a conceptual model for "Subduction Zones of the Caribbean".

Authors will find appropriate check boxes to choose the type of presentation they would prefer in the inscription form.

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List of talks

Funding

The project has received from IGCP 4000 US$ for year 2007, certainly not much to fully support the needs of all participants in this Guatemala event.

The IGCP 546 shall pay the hotel expenses of the participants at double rooms in moderate-rate hotels. For this, we shall reserve 1000 US$ out of the total 4000 US$.

Taking into account current criteria of positive discrimination, the following “rules” are to be applied to assign additional funds:

1 point = (3000 US$ + what's left after payment of rooms) / total number of points of all participants

Deadlines and forms

Pre-inscriptions received by June 30, 2007, will be given priority. Late applications will be considered on a space-available basis.

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Send back inscription form, abstracts, and/or student certificate.
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List of participants.

We look forward to seeing you in Guatemala in December 2007!

last modified: 01.12.08 12:19 +0100