STRUCTURAL GEOLOGY ALGORITHMS: VECTORS AND TENSORS

By Richard W. Allmendinger, Nestor Cardozo, and Donald M. Fisher (2012). Cambridge University Press, paperback 302 pages. ISBN: 978-1107401389. This book presents the mathematics behind structural geology and, by implication and example, tectonics—the difference being a matter of scale. The essence of structural geology is to understand the transition of an initial geometry (such as a layered sedimentary sequence) to a different final geometry (such as a fold and thrust belt). A huge part of that task involves characterizing the shape changes and their evolution, a prerequisite for understanding the driving forces behind such changes. That is a geometric and kinematic problem and the mathematical techniques of vector and tensor manipulation are ideally suited to the job. Some textbooks and lecture courses in structural geology tend to avoid or play down this mathematical framework, but this book does not: it puts the mathematics center stage and backs up the theoretical development with a suite of Matlab subroutines, which are given in the text and are available online. The book opens with a chapter on projections such as those used in constructing stereonets, then Chapters 2–5 introduce the …