Geographic Information Systems (GIS) Compilation of Geophysical, Geologic, and Tectonic Data for the Circum-North Pacific

The accompanying directory structure contains a Geographic Information Systems
(GIS) compilation of geophysical, geological, and tectonic data for the
Circum-North Pacific. This area includes the Russian Far East, Alaska, the
Canadian Cordillera, linking continental shelves, and adjacent oceans. This GIS
compilation extends from 120°E to 115°W, and from 40°N to 80°N. This area
encompasses: (1) to the south, the modern Pacific plate boundary of the
Japan-Kuril and Aleutian subduction zones, the Queen Charlotte transform fault,
and the Cascadia subduction zone; (2) to the north, the continent-ocean
transition from the Eurasian and North American continents to the Arctic Ocean;
(3) to the west, the diffuse Eurasian-North American plate boundary, including
the probable Okhotsk plate; and (4) to the east, the Alaskan-Canadian
Cordilleran fold belt. This compilation should be useful for: (1) studying the
Mesozoic and Cenozoic collisional and accretionary tectonics that assembled
this continental crust of this region; (2) studying the neotectonics of active
and passive plate margins in this region; and (3) constructing and interpreting
geophysical, geologic, and tectonic models of the region.

Geographic Information Systems (GIS) programs provide powerful tools for
managing and analyzing spatial databases. Geological applications include
regional tectonics, geophysics, mineral and petroleum exploration, resource
management, and land-use planning. This CD-ROM contains thematic layers of
spatial data-sets for geology, gravity field, magnetic field, oceanic plates,
overlap assemblages, seismology (earthquakes), tectonostratigraphic terranes,
topography, and volcanoes. The GIS compilation can be viewed, manipulated, and
plotted with commercial software (ArcView and ArcInfo) or through a freeware
program (ArcExplorer) that can be downloaded from http://www.esri.com for both
Unix and Windows computers using the button below.

[Summary provided by the USGS.]