Rio Grande rift: From tectonics to groundwater, north to south

Extending from Colorado, USA, to the state of Chihuahua, Mexico, the Rio Grande rift divides the Colorado Plateau on the west from the interior of the North American craton on the east. The rift is named after the Rio Grande, the major river that flows through most of its extent, from southern Colorado, through New Mexico, and along the border between Texas, USA, and the Mexican states of Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo León, and Tamaulipas.

Individual valleys of the Rio Grande rift are easy to recognize to the north, but more difficult in the Basin and Range in southern New Mexico, west Texas, and northern Mexico. This new book from The Geological Society of America focuses on the Rio Grande rift's upper crustal basins.

Editors Mark R. Hudson and V.J.S. (Tien) Grauch of the U.S. Geological Survey have organized the book geographically, with study areas progressing from north to south. Eighteen chapters cover a variety of topics, including sedimentation history, rift basin geometries and the influence of older structure on rift basin evolution, faulting and strain transfer within and among basins, relations of magmatism to rift tectonism, and basin hydrogeology.

More information:
Individual copies of the volume may be purchased through The Geological Society of America online bookstore, www.geosociety.org/bookstore/d … 0&catID=9&pID=SPE494, or by contacting GSA Sales and Service, gsaservice@geosociety.org.

Provided by Geological Society of America