January 22, 2004
Ophiolite basics
More on ophiolites... to help Leila get a grip on McPhee's Assembling California, which is rather technical and almost totally devoid of pictures. Michael Strickler's general tectonic overview has a very generic introduction to plate tectonics and what drives it.
His Ophiolite description goes into more detail about ophiolites, which are displaced remnants of deep ocean crust. Although you won't find such a pure ophiolite represented in nature, the idealized ophiolite column shown at right is a great key to understanding the layers.
If you look at the geologic map of California, the dark purple areas ("ultramafic rocks chiefly of Mesozoic age") are where ophiolites are likely to be found. This map is great because it gives a general regional picture -- rare for geologic maps, which are usually very small scale and have way too much detail.
