The Carpathian Mountains or Carpathians are a range of mountains forming an arc across Central Europe and Southeast Europe. Roughly 1,500 km (930 mi) long, it is the third-longest European mountain range after the Urals at 2,500 km (1,600 mi) and the Scandinavian Mountains at 1,700 km (1,100 mi). The range stretches from the far eastern Czech Republic (3%) and Austria (1%) in the northwest through Slovakia (21%), Poland (10%), Ukraine (10%), Romania (50%) to Serbia (5%) in the south. The highest range within the Carpathians is known as the Tatra Mountains in Poland and Slovakia, where the highest peaks exceed 2,600 m (8,500 ft). The second-highest range is the Southern Carpathians in Romania, where the highest peaks range between 2,500 m (8,200 ft) and 2,550 m (8,370 ft).
Obduction is a geological process whereby denser oceanic crust is scraped off a descending ocean plate at a convergent plate boundary and thrust on top of an adjacent plate. When oceanic and continental plates converge, normally the denser oceanic crust sinks under the continental crust in the process of subduction. Obduction, which is less common, normally occurs in plate collisions at orogenic belts or back-arc basins.
An ophiolite is a section of Earth's oceanic crust and the underlying upper mantle that has been uplifted and exposed, and often emplaced onto continental crustal rocks.
The Arabian-Nubian Shield (ANS) is an exposure of Precambrian crystalline rocks on the flanks of the Red Sea. The crystalline rocks are mostly Neoproterozoic in age. Geographically – and from north to south – the ANS includes parts of Israel, Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Yemen, and Somalia. The ANS in the north is exposed as part of the Sahara Desert and Arabian Desert, and in the south in the Ethiopian Highlands, Asir province of Arabia and Yemen Highlands.
The Pan-African orogeny was a series of major Neoproterozoic orogenic events which related to the formation of the supercontinents Gondwana and Pannotia about 600 million years ago. This orogeny is also known as the Pan-Gondwanan or Saldanian Orogeny. The Pan-African orogeny and the Grenville orogeny are the largest known systems of orogenies on Earth. The sum of the continental crust formed in the Pan-African orogeny and the Grenville orogeny makes the Neoproterozoic the period of Earth's history that has produced most continental crust.
A foreland basin is a structural basin that develops adjacent and parallel to a mountain belt. Foreland basins form because the immense mass created by crustal thickening associated with the evolution of a mountain belt causes the lithosphere to bend, by a process known as lithospheric flexure. The width and depth of the foreland basin is determined by the flexural rigidity of the underlying lithosphere, and the characteristics of the mountain belt. The foreland basin receives sediment that is eroded off the adjacent mountain belt, filling with thick sedimentary successions that thin away from the mountain belt. Foreland basins represent an endmember basin type, the other being rift basins. Space for sediments is provided by loading and downflexure to form foreland basins, in contrast to rift basins, where accommodation space is generated by lithospheric extension.
The Western Carpathians are an arc-shaped mountain range, the northern branch of the Alpine-Himalayan fold and thrust system called the Alpide belt, which evolved during the Alpine orogeny. In particular, their pre-Cenozoic evolution is very similar to that of the Eastern Alps, and they constitute a transition between the Eastern Alps and the Eastern Carpathians.
The Carpathian Flysch Belt is an arcuate tectonic zone included in the megastructural elevation of the Carpathians on the external periphery of the mountain chain. Geomorphologically it is a portion of the Outer Carpathians. Geologically it is a thin-skinned thrust belt or accretionary wedge, formed by rootless nappes consisting of so-called flysch – alternating marine deposits of claystones, shales and sandstones which were detached from their substratum and moved tens of kilometers to the north (generally). The Flysch Belt is together with Neogene volcanic complexes the only extant tectonic zone along the whole Carpathian arc.
The High Karst Unit is a tectonic unit in the Balkans region of Southeastern Europe, part of the Dinaric Alps or Dinarides, that is characterized by typical high-altitude karst features. It is found in Slovenia, Croatia, Italy, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Serbia, Montenegro and Albania.
The main points that are discussed in the geology of Iran include the study of the geological and structural units or zones; stratigraphy; magmatism and igneous rocks; ophiolite series and ultramafic rocks; and orogenic events in Iran.
The geology of Bosnia & Herzegovina is the study of rocks, minerals, water, landforms and geologic history in the country. The oldest rocks exposed at or near the surface date to the Paleozoic and the Precambrian geologic history of the region remains poorly understood. Complex assemblages of flysch, ophiolite, mélange and igneous plutons together with thick sedimentary units are a defining characteristic of the Dinaric Alps, also known as the Dinaride Mountains, which dominate much of the country's landscape.
The geology of Austria consists of Precambrian rocks and minerals together with younger marine sedimentary rocks uplifted by the Alpine orogeny.
The geology of North Macedonia includes the study of rocks dating to the Precambrian and a wide array of volcanic, sedimentary and metamorphic rocks formed in the last 539 million years.
The geology of Romania is structurally complex, with evidence of past crustal movements and the incorporation of different blocks or platforms to the edge of Europe, driving recent mountain building of the Carpathian Mountains. Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe. It borders the Black Sea to the southeast, Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, and Moldova to the east.
The geology of Slovakia is structurally complex, with a highly varied array of mountain ranges and belts largely formed during the Alpine orogeny in Mesozoic and Cenozoic eras and with relicts of older Variscan structures of Paleozoic age. The internal zones of the West Carpathian orogen collapsed during Paleogene forming the Central Carpathian Paleogne Basin and later in Miocene the Pannonian Basin and Carpathian volcanic chain were formed.
The geology of Croatia has some Precambrian rocks mostly covered by younger sedimentary rocks and deformed or superimposed by tectonic activity.
The geology of Greece is highly structurally complex due to its position at the junction between the European and African tectonic plates.
The geology of the Czech Republic is very tectonically complex, split between the Western Carpathian Mountains and the Bohemian Massif.
Stevan Karamata was a Serbian geologist, a member of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts, and a professor at the Faculty of Mining and Geology at the University of Belgrade.
The Central Asian Orogenic Belt (CAOB), also called the Altaids, is one of the world's largest Phanerozoic accretionary orogens, and thus a leading laboratory of geologically recent crustal growth. The orogenic belt is bounded by the East European Craton and the North China Craton in the Northwest-Southeast direction, as well as Siberia Craton and Tarim Craton in the Northeast-Southwest direction. It formed by ocean closures during Neoproterozoic to the late Phanerozoic time, from around 750 to 150 Ma. Like many other accretionary orogenic belts, the Central Asian Orogenic Belt consists of a huge amount of magmatic arcs, arc-related basins, accretionary complexes, seamounts, continental fragments and ophiolites. It is also considered a relatively distinctive collisional orogenic belt because widespread subduction-accretion complexes and arc magmatic rocks can be found in the region, but collision-related foreland basins are not common.
