Paul Mann

• PhD
• Professor of Geology and Robert E. Sheriff Endowed Chair at University of Houston

The tectonic origin of the Caribbean Large Igneous Province (CLIP) and its adjacent oceanic crust in the Colombian Basin are examined using 3D seismic reflection mapping, regional gravity and magnetic data mapping, and a compilation of CLIP radiometric ages. Using these data, we show how the CLIP and its adjacent oceanic crust formed by extensive a...

Recent studies and well results strongly suggest the presence of a thermogenic petroleum system in an area that has thus far been considered a biogenic gas play

The 2–10‐km‐thick, mainly carbonate cap of the 14,000 km² Bahamas carbonate platform (BCP) has impeded imaging of its underlying crustal structure. The deeper structure of the BCP records both its Mesozoic rift and hotspot history and its later deformation related to its Paleogene collision with the Great Arc of the Caribbean (GAC). We use regional...

The Barreirinhas Basin, located at the western end of the Romanche Fracture Zone along the Brazilian Equatorial Margin, forms one segment of the Brazilian Equatorial Margin, along with the Foz do Amazonas, Maranhao, Ceara, and Potiguar basins. All these basins formed by oblique, Early Cretaceous (Aptian-Albian) opening of the Equatorial Atlantic an...

Timing is a key data for understanding the origin of faulting. The Balcones fault system (BFS) extends ~600 km along the northern margin of the Gulf of Mexico oil basin and controls springs that supply the major cities in Texas, but its origin is unclear. We provide its first direct timing by applying U–Pb geochronology on seven calcite-mineralized...

Two structural styles for non-volcanic rifted margins in the external, necked zone of continental crust include: 1) a ductile and ultra-thin tapering of the external necked zone as defined by a very thin crust and distributed and minor, closely-spaced rifts; and 2) the formation of a single, "master" rift in the necked zone that has split to leave...

This study attempts to identify the suture zone between the Great Caribbean Arc and continental South America through an exhaustive compilation of radiometric ages covering diverse geological formations and regions from Ecuador-Colombia-Venezuela to Tobago. Also, we extend our compilation to Central America (Panama, Costa Rica, and Nicaragua) and t...

Previous workers have used stratigraphic studies to identify three potential marine gateways that connected the Atlantic and Mediterranean during the Messinian salinity crisis (MSC): the Strait of Gibraltar that remains a 300-900-m-deep channel to the present-day and the Betic and Rifian corridors now exposed on-land in southern Spain and northern...

Creataceous-Eocene island arc basement rocks of the northeastern Caribbean are actively deforming in a 250-km-wide zone of transpression between two, obliquely-converging bathymetric highs: the 25-km-thick Bahamas carbonate platform in the north and the 23-km-thick Beata ridge in the south. In this study we use potential fields data, earthquake and...

Early work on the seismic imaging of the Caribbean Plate assumed that the Colombian and Venezuelan basins and the dividing Beata Ridge were entirely underlain by the 8-20-km-thick volcanic crust of the Caribbean Large Igneous Province (CLIP) erupted in three pulses between the Aptian and Maastrichtian. Later work revealed two “windows” of normal oc...

Objectives/Scope: The main objective of this study is to assess the possible impact of the volcanic and non-volcanic segments of the Jurassic rifted margin on the hydrocarbon potential of the Mauritania-Senegal margins. Methods, Procedures, Process: The Mauritania-Senegal-Guinea-Bissau-Conakry (MSGBC) collective basins formed above the following...

Limited oil production of 50,000 barrels of oil in the Azua basin of south-central Dominican Republic during the 1940s was related to source rocks within Middle Miocene carbonate and reservoirs within overlying Upper Miocene/Lower Pliocene turbiditic sandstone. As a result, exploration for the past several decades remained focused on hydrocarbon pl...

The 110,000 km² Yucatan Basin in the northern Caribbean Sea is critical for understanding the Late Cretaceous to Recent tectonic evolution of the Caribbean‐North American plate boundary. This study integrates gravity, magnetic, and a 5,500 km grid of 2D seismic data to carry out a tectonostratigraphic analysis of the Yucatan Basin. These data provi...

The Port Isabel passive margin foldbelt covers 17,000 km2 of the northwestern, deepwater U.S. Gulf of Mexico (GOM). Seven oil exploration wells were drilled in the area from 1996 to 2007, yielding a single, uncommercial gas discovery. The 5-7 km thick Oligo-Miocene section prevented drilling from penetrating the underlying Paleogene and Mesozoic so...

The Mauritanian rifted-passive margin remains one of the least explored areas of the Mauritania-Senegal-Guinea-Bissau-Conakry (MSGBC) basin that includes: 1) the transition from the un-rifted, full-thickness, continental crust of the West African craton; 2) a relatively narrow and tapered zone of thinned continental crust in the coastal, shelf and...

The Campeche and Yucatan salt basins remain one of the least explored areas of the Gulf of Mexico basin. This study uses a grid of 23,600 line-km pre-stack depth migrated (PSDM) 2D seismic reflection profiles, shipborne gravity data, and open-source geologic information to model the thermal stress of four potential source intervals (Oxfordian, Tith...

The Camamu‐Almada segment of the northeastern Brazil rifted‐passive margin covers an area of 22,000 km² and includes: (a) thin to ultra‐thin metamorphic continental crust; (b) a transitional zone of unknown composition; and (c) Albian and younger oceanic crust. We investigate the structural‐magmatic evolution of the region by interpreting 19,000 li...

Deepwater passive margin foldbelts (PMFB) are the present and future focus of hydrocarbon exploration and production due to the abundance of undrilled structural traps, the presence of natural oil seeps and advances in deepwater drilling technology. PMFB are characterized by linked updip extension and downdip contraction detached over a basinward d...

Rifted-passive margins extend over a distance of 105,000 km of the Earth’s surface and account for 30% of the world’s giant oil and gas fields. Rifted-passive margins are largely known from subsurface mapping using various geophysical methods because they are largely covered by water and thick sedimentary and magmatic deposits. Most rifted-passive...

Deepwater Sedimentary Systems: Science, Discovery and Applications helps readers identify, understand and interpret deepwater sedimentary systems at various scales – both onshore and offshore. This book describes the best practices in the integration of geology, geophysics, engineering, technology and economics used to inform smart business decisio...

We describe the structure, stratigraphy, and hydrocarbon potential of the 1000-km-long Tarfaya-Dakhla Basin (TDB) along the Atlantic rifted-passive margin Morocco. Our dataset consists of a 4885-line km grid of depth-converted industry seismic data that are tied to three DSDP wells in the deepwater area and exploratory wells on the slope and shelf....

The region offshore the Guajira Peninsula of Colombia in the western Caribbean is a frontier exploration area known primarily from 2 and 3D seismic reflection surveys and a handful of well penetrations. After analyzing a grid of 2D seismic reflection profiles, we have identified the widespread presence of bottom simulating reflections (BSRs) in thi...

The subduction-to-strike-slip transition (SSST) zone of the southeastern Caribbean is one of the thirty identified locations where active subduction and strike-slip tectonic styles transition along strongly curved and seismogenic plate boundaries. We use approximately 10,000 km (6000 mi) of 2-D seismic reflection, well, seismic tomographic, gravity...

The age of the collision of the Panama arc against South America is the subject of ongoing research with geological studies proposing an Oligocene (30 Ma) formation of the isthmus while paleoceanographic results supporting a much younger isthmus formed by the Late Pliocene (2.8 Ma). This talk aims summarizes regional geologic-geophysical constraint...

The northwestern margin of South America has experienced different phases of deformation since the late Paleozoic related to continental and arc collisions, strike-slip events, and subduction of oceanic plateaus. The purpose of this talk is to isolate the effects of the most recent of these superimposed tectonic events: the collision of the Panama...

The Campeche salt basin along the southern Gulf of Mexico (GOM) remains one of the least explored areas of the GOM basin. The objectives of this study include: 1) to image the morphology of the top of Paleozoic crystalline basement; 2) to understand the role of Paleozoic orogenic basement architecture on total sediment thickness; and 3) to determin...

The northeast-southwest trending Port Isabel passive margin foldbelt spans over an area of 17,000 square kilometers in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico. Of the seven well drilled in the area, there was only one uncommercial hydrocarbon discovery at well PI#525. The abnormally thick Oligocene section prevented drilling activity from penetrating the infe...

Extending over 700 km along the southern Gulf of Mexico (GOM), the Callovian-Bajocian Campeche salt basin remains one of the least explored and drilled areas of the GOM basin. The objectives of this study include: 1) to image and structurally restore the morphology of the top of Paleozoic crystalline basement; 2) to understand the role of Paleozoic...

We report on progress of mapping and gravity modeling for the Moroccan margin. The Agadir-Essaouira-Rharb basin of northern Morocco is underlain by single marginal rift that can be seen on seismic data to contain the thickest salt sections that thickens and become more chaotic northward into the 14-km deep, Rharb subduction flexural basin west of t...

The Lamprea fold-belt is a 300 km-long, 20-60 km-wide, deep-water, passive margin fold-belt located southeast of the Salina del Bravo salt province and trending parallel to the eastern continental margin of Mexico. The Lamprea fold-belt detaches along Eocene shale layers to form a compressional toe of the gravitationally-driven system that forms a...

The late Jurassic Campeche salt basin in the southern Gulf of Mexico (GOM) forms a passive margin foldbelt of late Middle Miocene to the Recent age. The Campeche salt basin is defined by a 200-km-wide updip zone of listric, normal faults of the Comalcalco and Macuspana rifts, and a coeval, 300-km-wide, downdip zone of deeper-water, salt-cored folds...

The area of southeastern Papua New Guinea includes three active microplates – the Trobriand, Woodlark, and Solomon Sea plates – that are being deformed by regional convergence between the much larger Pacific and Australian Plates. The landward extent of the plate boundary between the Trobriand and Australian Plates corresponds to the Owen-Stanley F...

Kinematic analysis of faults in Trinidad reveals three main stages of the tectonic evolution of the southeastern Caribbean–South American plate boundary. During Stage 1, folding and thrusting occurred and are truncated by a Middle Miocene unconformity. This shortening event has been related by previous workers to the initial, oblique collision of...

Kinematic analysis of faults in Trinidad reveal three main stages of the tectonic evolution of the southeastern Caribbean–South American plate boundary. The polyphase evolution of Trinidad results from the eastward motion of the Caribbean arc and the propagation of the southern Subduction-Transform Edge Propagator (STEP) fault of the Caribbean sub...

The Campeche salt province forms a passive margin foldbelt with an updip shelf and slope zone of normal faults and a downdip, deep-water zone of folds, thrusts and salt related structures of mid-Miocene to Recent age. We have integrated shipborne magnetic and 23,600 line-km of pre-stack depth migrated 2D seismic data tied to published wells in orde...

The late Jurassic Campeche salt basin in the southern GOM forms a passive margin foldbelt with an updip zone of normal faults in the 10-km-thick, 80-km wide late Miocene to Recent Comalcalco and associated rifts and a coeval, 500-km-wide, downdip zone of deeper-water, salt-cored folds, thrusts, and diapirs. In order to reconstruct the geometry and...

The Permian Basin of west Texas and southeast New Mexico is currently the most prolific oil-producing basin in the United States. This region experienced deformation and extreme rates of subsidence (up to 500 m/my), especially during the Late Paleozoic. To investigate the larger-scale crustal geometry of the Permian Basin, its tectonic evolution, a...

The Maracaibo block is a triangular, continental tectonic terrane that includes two isolated Andean ranges of northern Colombia and western Venezuela: the Sierra de Santa Marta Massif (SSMM; maximum elevation 5700 m) in the west and the Perija Range (PR; 3600 m) to the east. The Cesar-Rancheria Basin (CRB) is an intermontane basin that separates th...

We define the structure and stratigraphy of the central area of the Colombian Basin - offshore the northern Caribbean coast of Colombia - using ~8400 line km of depth-converted 2D seismic data assembled from academic and industry sources. We integrate information from offset DSDP and ODP wells into a structural and stratigraphic model of the Colomb...

The Campeche salt province (CSP) in the southeastern Gulf of Mexico was deposited in a broad, Callovian-Bajocian sag basin following Phase 1 GOM rifting during the late Triassic-early Jurassic rifting. The CSP has undergone multiple phases of salt-involved deformation that has resulted in various and complex structural styles across the region. In...

Oil seeps and small-production oilfields in south-central Hispaniola are regionally isolated from much larger hydrocarbon provinces in the circum-Gulf of Mexico and northern South America. In this study, we evaluate the tectonic, stratigraphic and structural setting of these hydrocarbon occurrences. The zone of late Miocene to Recent oblique conver...

We combine previous data from Mesozoic-Cenozoic outcrops in the Guajira Peninsula of northern Colombia with regional gravity, bathymetric, and seismic interpretations to demonstrate the existence of a 280-km-long western extension of the Great Arc of the Caribbean (GAC) along the continental margin of Colombia. Seismic data reveal an 80- to 100-km-...

Over 72 exploration wells have been drilled on the Caribbean islands of Hispaniola and Puerto Rico over the past century, but with no commercial success. A question is whether these Caribbean oceanic islands have experienced sufficient subsidence and burial for any potential source rocks to reach maturity and produce commercial hydrocarbons. Subsur...

The extensive Callovian-Bajocian Isthmian salt basin - extending over a distance of 700 km along the southern Gulf of Mexico (GOM) - remains the least explored and drilled areas of the GOM compared to better explored sub-salt plays of the larger Louann salt - extending along 900 km along the conjugate margin in northern GOM. The Isthmian salt basin...

Transpressional strike-slip fault zones closely control the distribution, shape, tectonic uplift and exhumation of blueschist belts in the northern Caribbean and circum-Pacific. Tectonic uplift and exhumation of blueschist belts are proposed to occur in all examples by reverse or thrust faults within the upthrown, commonly convex sides of presently...

The Putumayo foreland basin (PFB) is an underexplored, hydrocarbon-bearing basin located in southernmost Colombia. The PFB forms a 250-km long segment of the 7000-km-long corridor of Late Cretaceous-Cenozoic foreland basins produced by eastward thrusting of the Andean mountain chain over Precambrian rocks of the South American craton. We use ∼4000...

Thick sedimentary cover (≤16 km), vintage seismic and disparate crustal terranes have hindered understanding of the basement underlying the Caribbean plate. The plate formed by Early Cretaceous to Miocene amalgamation of four crustal types: the Caribbean Large Igneous Province oceanic plateau; the Chortis continental block; the related Great Arc of...

The stratigraphy, structure and hydrocarbon potential of the deep-water Yucatan margin remains less understood than other margins of the Gulf of Mexico (GoM), as Yucatan has not been systematically mapped and has few well penetrations. Despite the presence of widespread oil slicks along the continent–ocean boundary, the maturity and distribution of...

Active tectonic deformation and seismicity of Hispaniola define a 250 km-wide, obliquely collisional zone between the Bahamas, the island arc of Hispaniola and the Caribbean Large Igneous Province (CLIP). To reflect how collision is accommodated within Hispaniola, we calculate river normalized steepness and terrain surface roughness to reveal the a...

The geology of the Gulf of Mexico-Caribbean-Central America region and its five major ocean basins was shaped by late Paleozoic formation of the Pangean supercontinent that was followed by breakup of the supercontinent Pangea during the Triassic and Jurassic period. The Gulf of Mexico (GOM) basin opened in two phases in the period of late Triassic...

Trinidad, the Gulf of Paria, and Eastern Venezuela lie in a diffuse and complex zone of Cenozoic tectonic interaction between the Caribbean and South America plates. Numerous models have being proposed to explain the complex tectono-stratigraphie evolution of the area. In this paper, we interpret an integrated data base consisting of well logs and...