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The New Global Tectonic Map—Analyses and Implications

Article  in  Terra Nova · June 2023

DOI: 10.1111/ter.12662

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Received: 30 January 2023    Revised: 14 April 2023    Accepted: 26 April 2023

DOI: 10.1111/ter.12662

FOCUS ARTICLE

The new global tectonic map—­Analyses and implications

Janpieter van Dijk

OCRE, The Hague, The Netherlands

Correspondence
Janpieter van Dijk, OCRE, The Hague, The
Netherlands.
Email: janpieter.vandijk@live.com
Abstract
A full new tectonic model of the Earth is presented based a complete new tectonic
interpretation carried out during a 10-­year project. It covers a huge amount of avail-
able geophysical and geological datasets, where ca. 11 000 tectonic elements such
as faults and thrusts, transform faults, rift zones, passive margins and oceanic exten-
sion ridges and numerous other features have been mapped, and classified follow-
ing the geological literature. The complete surface of the Earth has been subdivided
into 1.180 larger and smaller tectonic terranes, in the domains of continental blocks,
oceanic plates and mobile zones. Numerical multiscale statistical fabric analyses on
orientation, length and area are presented on the digitised tectonic elements and the
classified terranes using the first Digital Twin of the Earth. Graphical representation
through maps with different projections and viewpoints, and planetary views, are
presented to illustrate the new subdivision. Some important implications for plate
tectonic reconstructions are being discussed.

KEYWORDS
Continents, Digital Twin, Faults, Fractures, GIS, Mountain Belts, Oceans, Plate Tectonics,
Terranes

1  |  I NTRO D U C TI O N geological evidence. This has resulted in numerous and considerable

Previously, directly following the advent of plate tectonics, the Earth
was believed to be subdivided into a discrete number of a few large
plates (Le Pichon, 1968; Morgan, 1968). Numerous revisions in the
definition of these plates have been presented over the years, which
have introduced more and more subdivisions of the primary plates
into smaller blocks, and redefinitions of their boundaries, sometimes
limited to a certain geographic area, and most of the times only
for the continental domains (e.g., Bird, 2003; DeMets et al., 1990-­
NUVEL; Hasterok et al., 2022; Hochard, 2008; Kreemer et al., 2000,
2003, 2014-­GSRM; Laske et al., 2013; Merdith et al., 2021; Seton
et al., 2012, 2020; PaleoMAP see e.g., Argus et al., 2011-­MORVEL;
Graham et al., 2018-­GBM; Scotese & van der Pluijm, 2020; Vérard
et al., 2015-­PaleoDyn; see the last for an extensive review of pre-
vious proposals). The difference with these previous revisions lies
is the fact that the present proposal is supported by a full original
and new interpretation of tectonic elements for both the continen-
tal and the oceanic domains, based on available geophysical and
differences between previous classifications and subdivisions and
the hereby presented New Global Tectonic Map, specifically for the
oceanic domains (Figure 1).
The present note presents the completely new subdivision and
briefly describes the data used and the procedures that have been
followed, and criteria that were established. Important support
stems from a tremendous amount of new geophysical data (gravi-
metry and magnetometry) that have become available from satellite
surveys during the last decades, which permitted to perform a new
and complete original tectonic interpretation of both continental and
oceanic domains which was conducted during a 10 year timespan.
The new interpretation of tectonic boundaries (ca. 11 000), com-
bined with a review of geological maps of the continents, available
data on the oceanic domains and a review of previous projects per-
mitted to define 1.180 terranes. Multiscale analyses of orientation
and sizes of tectonic elements, and of the areal sizes of the terranes
will be presented and discussed. The note comprises extensive illus-
trations showing the features and subdivisions in various geographic

Terra Nova. 2023;00:1–27. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/ter |

© 2023 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.     1
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F I G U R E 1  The New Global Tectonic Map, showing the 1.180 Terranes/Microplates. Depicted are the digitised elements (faults, thrusts,
transform faults, etc.) and a subdivision in three main domains: Green: Continental lithosphere blocks (pre-­Triassic accreted terranes,
Hercynian, Caledonian, Variscan, Neoproterozoic, Archean, etc.), Blue: Mesozoic till Recent oceanic crust plates; Orange: Mesozoic till
Recent Mobile Belts (a mix of the other two domains, and newly generated small oceanic basins). See Figure 2c for the legend of the tectonic
elements. WGS84 Mercator projection.

projections. The results will be briefly discussed, and some impli-
cations are outlined for plate tectonic reconstructions and models.
2  |  C R ITE R I A A N D M E TH O D O LO G Y
The datasets that have been used in the present project are summa-
rised in Table 1, and examples are provided in Figure 2a.
A tectonic interpretation of both continental and oceanic
domains has been performed, whereby elements such as faults,
thrusts, transform faults, fracture zones, domain boundaries have
been mapped, specifically using a combination of gravimetric and
magnetic anomalies, and available geological/tectonic maps. This
resulted in a global map with ca. 11 000. elements (6.191 faults,
2.966 transform faults, 485 rift segments, 108 passive margin
segments, 1.076 oceanic ridges and hotspot trends and various
other features; with a total of ca. 75 000 globally distributed dig-
ital segments) (Figures 1 and 2). Out of these, ca. 650 main fea-
tures have been given their proper names as used in the literature
concerning the areas. Tools that have been used for the analyses
include Google Earth Pro, ArcGIS of Esri, AutoCAD of Autodesk,
QGIS, Google Maps and OpenStreetMap and various online ap-
plications to examine specific public domain datasets. Snapshots
from various working environments are used as illustrations for
the present paper. These tectonic elements are divided in differ-
ent groups according to their geological nature: Faults and thrusts
within the contractional belts, continental blocks and also within
the oceanic domains, dikes, oceanic transform faults, lineaments
of volcanic origin within the oceanic plates, small escarpments
in the oceanic domains possibly related to these volcanic zones,
large oceanic rift zones, large continental margin faults, bound-
aries of suture zones within the continental blocks, but also
general lineaments/breaks visible in magnetic, gravity, heat flow,
topography, and related datasets and elaborations of the same.
Furthermore, in some cases the magnetic striping patterns in the
oceanic domains was mapped separately. Features like ‘highs and
lows’, ‘mountain ranges’ or ‘basins’, as distinguished and officially
defined in many works, have not been used per-­s e to classify the
terranes, as they can overlap with these or cover only limited
areas within them.
Combining this interpretation with the available geological and
geophysical literature on the various areas, a subdivision is proposed
(Figures 1 and 2; Table 2). Although a much-­debated term (see dis-
cussion in e.g., Sengör, 1990; pp. 155–­161) the most suitable word
to capture all elements would be ‘terrane’, simply defining it as a
fault-­bounded unit of rocks. When referring to the originally defined
larger Plates which are hereby split up, the term ‘Megaplates’ is pre-
ferred. For the names of the single terranes, a mix of nomenclature
has been used, where terms such as block, plate, terrane, belt, zone,
suture, microplate, sliver, fragment, lid, swirl, lens, duplex, fault zone,
mobile belt, collage, etc. have been deployed. This is to comply with
previous terms used in the literature for these areas, so that the clas-
sification can easily be recognised.
It is out of the scope of the present note to discuss all the var-
ious choices made and the literature consulted, which amounts to
thousands of papers, reports and maps. At present, a digital bibliog-
raphy is maintained which comprises ca. 12 000 indexed references,
supported by a digital library containing over 75 000 items that have
been consulted over the years. In the Bibliography provided addi-
tional to this paper an extensive codified list of 3.642 selected sup-
porting papers for the various terranes is provided. A critical analysis
is presented in Figure 2b.
The terranes have been mapped as separate polygons leaving
spaces between them. These spaces are an indication for the fact

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