Instead of the ridges moving away from each other, like other strike-slip faults, transform fault ridges will stay in the same fixed location, and the new ocean sea floor being created at the ridges is pushed away from the ridge. Transform faults move differently than a strike-slip fault at the mid-oceanic ridge. This lateral movement of sea floors past each other is where transform faults are currently active. Although, separated only by tens of kilometers, this separation between the ridges causes the sea floor to be pushed pass each other in opposing directions. With new sea floor being pushed and pulled out, the older sea floor slowly slides away from the mid-oceanic ridges toward the continents. These mid-oceanic ridges are where new sea floor is constantly created through the up welling of new basaltic magma. Transform faults are commonly found linking segments of mid-oceanic ridges or spreading centers. Transform faults also act as the plane of weakness allowing for the splitting in rift zones. Transform faults specifically relieve strain by transporting the strain between ridges or subduction zones. The effect of a fault is to relieve strain, which can be caused by compression, extension, or lateral stress in the rock layers at the surface or deep in the Earth’s subsurface. Transform fault File:Transcurrent NEW.jpg Finally, transform faults can form a tectonic plate boundary, while transcurrent faults cannot. In addition, transform faults have equal deformation across the entire fault line, while transcurrent faults have greater displacement in the middle of the fault zone and less on the margins. Both types of faults are strike-slip or side-to-side in movement, (see diagrams to the right) however transform faults end at the junction of another plate boundary or fault type, while transcurrent faults die out without a junction. Transform faults are closely related to transcurrent faults. Difference between transform and transcurrent faults This hypothesis was confirmed in a study of the fault plane solutions that showed the slip on transform faults points in the opposite direction than classical interpretation would suggest. Slip along transform faults does not increase the distance between the ridges it separates the distance remains constant in earthquakes because the ridges are spreading centers. The new class of faults, called transform faults, produce slip in the opposite direction from what one would surmise from the standard interpretation of an offset geological feature. John Tuzo Wilson recognized that the offsets of oceanic ridges by faults do not follow the classical pattern of an offset fence or geological marker in Reid’s rebound theory of faulting, from which the sense of slip is derived. 2 Difference between transform and transcurrent faults.
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