Tectonic and sedimentary evolution of a Cretaceous continental arc–backarc system in the Korean peninsula: New view

This paper focuses on the tectonic and sedimentary evolution of the Cretaceous volcanic rocks and nonmarine successions in the southeastern part of the Korean peninsula, which constitute an ancient continental arc system. The arc system (Gyeongsang Arc System), comprising an arc platform (Gyeongsang Volcanic Arc) and a backarc basin (Gyeongsang Backarc Basin), was a southwestward extension of the Japanese Arc formed by oblique northward subduction of the proto-Pacific (Izanagi) plate under the Asian continent. The backarc basin was initiated in the southeastern part of the Korean peninsula in the Early Cretaceous as a narrow NS-trending trough. The basin was bounded by a major fault in the northern part of the basin from which sediments largely emanated. Sediments were deposited in streamflow-dominated alluvial fans adjacent to the fault-bounded basin margin in the north and low-gradient fluvial systems of braided channels that extended southward and southeastward for tens of kilometers. Sediments were also derived from the western highland margin, draining Precambrian to Jurassic basement rocks. The initially narrow trough progressively expanded toward the east, resulting in eastward migration of depocenters that eventually generated a broad fluvio-lacustrine plain fringing the volcanic arc platform. The arc platform played an important role for the derivation of volcanogenic materials and accreted sediments into the backarc basin via extensive fluvial network. Pyroclastic density currents and landslides, which originated from the arc platform, also entered the basin. In addition, extrusion of basaltic volcanic rocks was continual within the basin during basin expansion. The resultant succession of mixed sedimentary and volcanogenic rocks is generally indicative of a temporal increase in volcanic activity in the arc platform and in subsidence rate of the basin. In the Late Cretaceous, andesitic to rhyolitic volcanism became climactic in the arc platform, producing a number of calderas or volcanotectonic depressions. Volcaniclastic aprons fringing the arc platform encroached upon the basin fill. Intraarc basins, produced by sinistral shearing of the arc platform, received sediments from active volcanoes and footwalls of contemporaneous faults, forming small-scale streamflow-dominated alluvial fans and floodplains with later development of a deep lake. Overall, the Gyeongsang Arc System formed under an extensional or transtensional (sinistral strike–slip) s