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Fluid flow paths in the Middle America Trench and Costa Rica margin

¹ Earth Sciences Department, University of California, Santa Cruz, California 95064, USA
² Scripps Institution of Oceanography, La Jolla, California 92093, USA
³ Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri 63130, USA
⁴ Institute for Geophysics, University of Texas, Austin, Texas 78759-8500, USA

The hydrology of the subducting plate and its dewatering behavior through the shallow subduction zone is linked to the structure and deformation of the forearc prism, the nature of the seismogenic zone, the composition of seawater for selected elements, and the composition of the residual slab subducted to depths of magma generation at the volcanic arc. Two locally independent systems of fluid flow govern the transport of heat and chemistry through the Costa Rica subduction complex, a dominantly nonaccretionary subduction zone. One fluid system is the margin wedge, décollement, and underthrust sediment section. Fluid sources include local sediment compaction and mineral dehydration at depth. A second flow system occurs in basement, beneath the sedimentary sequence on the incoming plate. This region is characterized by extremely low conductive heat flow, and the sediment overlying basement has pore-water geochemistry similar to that of seawater. Flow nearly parallel to the trench could be directed by permeability associated with faults and driven by a combination of differential heating and earthquake strain cycling.

Key Words: Central America • geochemistry • heat flow • hydrogeology • subduction zones

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