In 2024, the Senate of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) established the Priority Programme “Plate Deformation and Geohazards: The Eastern Margin of the Adriatic Plate (DEFORM)” (SPP 2497). The programme is designed to run for six years. In May 2024 proposals for the first three-year funding period were invited which are currently under evaluation.

DEFORM focuses at the plate scale on the Adriatic Plate, in particular on its eastern margin, and at the local scale on active fault systems in two key areas: (i) the transition from the Dinarides to the Hellenides and (ii) the Kefalonia Fault System. Adria represents a striking example of an actively deforming plate as it is consumed by subduction on both sides and is a key component in a complex continental collision system, giving rise to considerable geohazards. The area is therefore ideally suited to link geodynamic processes to lithospheric deformation and associated geohazards. Despite the presence of seismically highly active structures, the eastern margin of the Adriatic Plate has hitherto been much less studied than its western counterpart in the Apennines, and represents the missing piece in the puzzle to detangle the geodynamics of the central Mediterranean. The development of hazard scenarios will focus on two key areas that were repeatedly struck by devastating earthquakes. They include Europe’s most active strike-slip fault – the Kefalonia Transform Fault System – that has developed above the northern edge of the oceanic Hellenic Subduction Zone, where the transition from oceanic to continental subduction can be studied in situ. Causes for the change in tectonic styles will be deciphered in the Dinarides-Hellenides transition, for example at the Scutari-Pec Fault System located at the transition from the retreating subduction in the Hellenides to the advancing Dinaridic collisional system.

PI: Claudio Faccenna (GFZ), Thomas Meier (Uni Kiel)
Involved GFZ sections: 2.1, 2.4, 2.5, 2.6, 4.1, 4.5, 4.6