The Coastal Batholith of Peru () is a group of hundreds, if not thousands, of individual

pluton In geology, an igneous intrusion (or intrusive body or simply intrusion) is a body of intrusive igneous rock that forms by crystallization of magma slowly cooling below the surface of the Earth. Intrusions have a wide variety of forms and com ...

s that crop out near or at the coast of

Peru Peru, officially the Republic of Peru, is a country in western South America. It is bordered in the north by Ecuador and Colombia, in the east by Brazil, in the southeast by Bolivia, in the south by Chile, and in the south and west by the Pac ...

. The batholith runs a length of ca. 1600 km. Most of the plutons of the batholith were intruded in an elongated coast-parallel

extensional In any of several fields of study that treat the use of signs — for example, in linguistics, logic Logic is the study of correct reasoning. It includes both formal and informal logic. Formal logic is the study of deductively valid infe ...

basin. The

magma Magma () is the molten or semi-molten natural material from which all igneous rocks are formed. Magma (sometimes colloquially but incorrectly referred to as ''lava'') is found beneath the surface of the Earth, and evidence of magmatism has also ...

that formed the batholith's plutons is thought to have originated from the

partial melting Partial melting is the phenomenon that occurs when a rock is subjected to temperatures high enough to cause certain minerals to melt, but not all of them. Partial melting is an important part of the formation of all igneous rocks and some metamorp ...

hydrated In chemistry, a hydrate is a substance that contains water or its constituent elements. The chemical state of the water varies widely between different classes of hydrates, some of which were so labeled before their chemical structure was understo ...

basaltic rocks at the base of the crust during

rift In geology, a rift is a linear zone where the lithosphere is being pulled apart and is an example of extensional tectonics. Typical rift features are a central linear downfaulted depression, called a graben, or more commonly a half-graben ...

ing (extension). Subsequently, the rift basin was inverted. During the ascent the magma followed vertical pathways but emplacement was mostly in the form of tabular bodies. Plutons of the batholith intrude both the deformed

strata In geology and related fields, a stratum (: strata) is a layer of Rock (geology), rock or sediment characterized by certain Lithology, lithologic properties or attributes that distinguish it from adjacent layers from which it is separated by v ...

Marañón fold and thrust belt Marañón may refer to: * Marañón, Navarre, a town and municipality in Spain * Marañón River, in Peru * Marañón Province, in Peru * Valle del Marañón, a valley in Peru * Gregorio Marañón (1887–1960), Spanish physician, historian, write ...

and the

Casma Group The Casma Group () is a stratigraphic group of Cretaceous (Albian to Cenomanian) sedimentary formations exposed along the coast and within the Cordillera Occidental near Casma, Peru. Description The sediments of the Casma Group reflect depos ...

References

Batholiths of South America Geology of Peru {{geology-stub

See also

References