EA45CH13-Hall ARI 14 August 2017 13:28

Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences

Southeast Asia: New Views

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of the Geology of the

Malay Archipelago
Robert Hall
SE Asia Research Group, Department of Earth Sciences, Royal Holloway University of
London, Egham TW20 0EX, United Kingdom; email: [email protected]

Annu. Rev. Earth Planet. Sci. 2017. 45:331–58 Keywords

First published as a Review in Advance on June 7, subduction, tectonic reconstructions, seismic tomography, Indonesia,
2017
Malaysia
The Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences is
online at earth.annualreviews.org Abstract
https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-earth-063016- Southeast (SE) Asia is surrounded by subduction zones causing intense seis-
020633
micity and volcanic activity. Subduction has been the principal tectonic driver
Copyright  c 2017 by Annual Reviews. of collisions that caused the growth of continental SE Asia, and most re-
All rights reserved
cently the collision of Australia with SE Asia. The western part of SE Asia,
Sundaland, is a heterogeneous and weak region, reflecting processes that can
be observed today in the east, where there are subduction zones in different
ANNUAL
REVIEWS Further stages of development. A close relationship between subduction rollback and
Click here to view this article's extension has caused dramatic elevation of land, exhumation of deep crust,
online features: and spectacular subsidence of basins, observable with remotely acquired im-
• Download figures as PPT slides
• Navigate linked references ages and seismic and multibeam data obtained from oil exploration. New
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short time intervals. Laboratory studies, modeling, and reconstructions pro-
vide valuable insights, but field-based studies continue to present surprises
and new discoveries essential for interpretations of the geological history of
the region.

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 EA45CH13-Hall ARI 14 August 2017 13:28

1. INTRODUCTION
The term Southeast (SE) Asia is used in various ways by different disciplines and authors. I use it
here for the region in which the great nineteenth-century naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace trav-
eled and where he developed his ideas concerning evolution (Figure 1). Wallace (1869) called
the region that includes the countries of Malaysia, Brunei, and Indonesia, along with some of
southern Thailand and the Philippines, the Malay Archipelago. He made many insightful geolog-
ical observations. He drew attention to the great area of islands between Asia and Australia and to
the extensive shallow seas surrounding SE Asia and Australia (Figure 1a), and he inferred that the
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islands east of Java and Borneo had formed part of an Australian or Pacific continent, in contrast
to the western islands, which had been part of Asia. He divided the region into western and eastern
parts on the basis of geological observations and contrasted their faunas. Wallace speculated that
earthquakes and volcanic activity might increase sediment output from rivers, causing an ocean
as wide as the modern Atlantic to be reduced to a narrow sea with islands similar to the modern
archipelago. By 1869 he had a dynamic and prescient view of geological change manifested in SE
Asia, but it was another century before plate tectonics offered a convincing mechanism for his
interpretations (see the sidebar titled Wallace on Geology).
Early-twentieth-century fixist views considered the SE Asian continent a shield. The applica-
tion of plate tectonic ideas from the 1970s led to a picture of a strong stable interior region sur-
rounded by collision zones dominated by plate convergence. In this review, I explain how views of
the region have been changing and discuss the new data that have led to these changes. The older,
western part of SE Asia has features that are consequences of processes that can be observed and
are ongoing in the younger, eastern part of the region, where Australia and SE Asia are actively
colliding. What we observe there today has great relevance for our understanding of the early
stages of collision in orogenic belts in other parts of the world, such as the Alps, the Himalayas,
and the Central Asian Orogenic Belt. Because many of these features are so young, it is possible to
assess timing and rates or processes with an accuracy that was not possible in older mountain belts.
SE Asia has always been a region where tectonic ideas have been generated, simply because
this is where things are happening (subduction, seismicity, volcanic activity, collision, faulting,
subsidence, uplift). It remains such a place. Comparison of its size to that of North America
or Europe (Figure 2) shows immediately how understudied the region is, and topographic and
geologic maps reveal how difficult access remains to the interior of the many large islands as
a result of terrain, climate, vegetation, and lack of infrastructure. Borneo is one example: Major
parts of the interior of the world’s third-largest island remain almost unexplored. Seram is another
example: A major mapping program of the second-largest island in the Banda Arc was undertaken

WALLACE ON GEOLOGY

“In the Malay Archipelago we have, I believe, a case exactly parallel to that which I have here supposed. We have
indications of a vast continent, with a peculiar fauna and flora, having been gradually and irregularly broken up;
the island of Celebes probably marking its furthest westward extension, beyond which was a wide ocean. At the
same time Asia appears to have been extending its limits in a south-east direction, first in an unbroken mass, then
separated into islands as we now see it, and almost coming into actual contact with the scattered fragments of the
great southern land. From this outline of the subject, it will be evident how important an adjunct Natural History is
to Geology; not only in interpreting the fragments of extinct animals found in the earth’s crust, but in determining
past changes in the surface which have left no geological record.” (Wallace 1869, p. 27)

332 Hall
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PHILIPPINES

MALAYSIA

BORNEO

Sumatra
NEW
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Sulawesi
GUINEA

Java

Timor
Bali Lombok Sumba

a AUSTRALIA

Sulu PHILIPPINES
South China Philippine
Sea Sea
Sea Pacific
5°N Brunei Sabah Ocean
Malaysia
Celebes
Sea
Sarawak
Caroline
BORNEO Halmahera Sea
EQ Sumatra Sunda
Shelf
ait
Latitude

r Str

Wallace’s Kalimantan NEW

1854–1862
Makassa

travels Banda GUINEA

Sulawesi Seram
Sea Buru
Earthquake
5°S hypocenter depths Java Sea Aru
Su

101–200 km
nd

201–300 km
aT

301–400 km nc Java
re

h
401–500 km Indian Tanimbar
501–600 km Ocean Bali Timor
10°S >600 km Lombok Sumba
Kilometers
Java Trench
b 0 500 1,000 AUSTRALIA
95°E 100°E 105°E 110°E 115°E 120°E 125°E 130°E 135°E
Longitude

Figure 1
(a) Digital elevation model (DEM) of the Southeast Asia region from satellite gravity-derived bathymetry combined with SRTM
(Shuttle Radar Topography Mission) topography (Sandwell & Smith 2009) showing Quaternary volcanoes (yellow dots). (b) Principal
geographic features and seismicity with hypocenter depths (Engdahl et al. 1998). The dashed blue lines represent Wallace’s routes
during his travels in the Malay Archipelago between 1854 and 1862.

by the Dutch Ceram-Expeditie 100 years ago, in 1918–1919 (Rutten 1927). Since then, there
have been only a handful of studies of the island. Recent reports by Pownall et al. (2013, 2014) of
Neogene ultrahigh-temperature metamorphic rocks on Seram, known elsewhere almost entirely
from Precambrian terranes, illustrate what potentially remains to be discovered.
Field-based studies remain vital but have become less frequent. However, although reduced in
number, they have been aided recently by modern technology during investigations of previously

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a b
~ 5,000 kilometers ~ 5,000 kilometers

Figure 2
Comparison of the size of Southeast Asia to (a) the coterminous United States and (b) Europe. The number of geological studies per
unit area in Southeast Asia is significantly smaller than in both.

studied and little-studied areas, of which there remain many. GPS (Global Positioning System)
navigation devices, combined with public-domain SRTM (Shuttle Radar Topography Mission)
and ASTER (Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer) images, are
resources that have greatly aided field studies and stimulated new interpretations. Offshore, ex-
ploration for hydrocarbons has led to the acquisition of high-resolution multibeam bathymetric
maps and seismic data, which have provided new insights and helped link observations on land to
those offshore (see the sidebar titled Multibeam Bathymetry). Because deformation is very young
or active, the remotely acquired data commonly display structures not previously seen (air photos
and Landsat images, for example, are commonly limited by vegetation and cloud cover) and provide
the basis for new tectonic interpretations. Laboratory studies of rocks sampled on land, particu-
larly high-quality U-Pb dating of zircons and Ar-Ar dating of other minerals, add the information
required to build tectonic models and plate reconstructions. Seismic tomography is providing an
invaluable way of testing and improving these models. The combination of new field and laboratory
studies with imagery and offshore data is changing our view of the tectonic history of the region.

2. TECTONIC SETTING
The interior of SE Asia includes the shallow Java Sea and Sunda Shelf and the surrounding
emergent (but mainly topographically low) areas of Sumatra, the Thai–Malay peninsula, and
Borneo; this area is largely free of seismicity and volcanism (Figure 1b). This tectonically quiet
region forms the continental core of Sundaland (Hall & Morley 2004), which formed an exposed

MULTIBEAM BATHYMETRY

Multibeam surveys measure the seafloor depth to within a few centimeters using a high-resolution echo sounder.
Typically, two orthogonal transducer arrays transmit beams of acoustic energy and receive the acoustic energy
reflected back from the seafloor. The system calculates the location of each beam on the seafloor by knowing the
location, orientation, and position of the transmit array at the time of transmission; the two-way travel time; and
the location, orientation, and position of the receive array at the time the energy returns. It then makes a correction
for refraction in the water column (Orange et al. 2010). The grid for the bathymetric maps typically has a pixel size
of 15–25 m, similar to that of SRTM and ASTER imagery.

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SUBDUCTION ROLLBACK

The idea of subduction rollback has been around for many years (e.g., Molnar & Atwater 1978, Carlson & Melia
1984). Hamilton (1981) was probably the first to identify its importance for Indonesia, but its role in SE Asian
tectonics is still often overlooked. Subduction can be viewed as convergence between two plates, one of which
subducts beneath the other. Alternatively, subduction may occur without plate convergence, and it can be considered
one plate sinking into the mantle under the influence of gravity. As the plate sinks, the subduction zone moves toward
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the lower plate in a process that has been described as subduction/slab/hinge rollback or hinge/trench retreat. This
process induces extension in the upper plate to fill the space created by the migrating hinge.

landmass during the Pleistocene. Sundaland is bordered by tectonically active zones characterized
by earthquakes and volcanic activity. Seismicity (Engdahl et al. 1998) and GPS measurements
(Bock et al. 2003, Simons et al. 2007) suggest that a SE Asian or Sunda plate is currently moving
very slowly relative to the Eurasian plate. Relative to SE Asia, the Indian–Australian plate is moving
north-northeast at approximately 7 cm/year, whereas to the east the Pacific plates (Philippine Sea,
Caroline, and Pacific), are moving toward SE Asia at even faster rates (DeMets et al. 2010). The
major consequence of these convergent motions is subduction, and subduction zones are well
defined by seismicity to depths of approximately 660 km and by volcanic arcs. The region records
the result of long-term subduction and collisions at the margins of the continental core of the
archipelago during the last 300 million years.
The lengths of slabs in the upper mantle that have been identified by seismicity record subduc-
tion, depending on convergent rates, during the last 10 to 25 million years. P-wave tomography
(Widiyantoro & van der Hilst 1997, Hall & Spakman 2015) has imaged the subducted slabs as rel-
atively high velocity anomalies in the mantle and can help decipher a longer history. For example,
below Java the subducted slab becomes almost vertical below approximately 300 km and a positive
velocity anomaly can be traced to depths of approximately 1,500 km in the lower mantle, whereas
further east in the Banda Arc there is a large flat-lying slab resting on the 660-km discontinuity and
no penetration of the lower mantle. This difference results from a change in subduction history
from west to east, with a relatively recent episode of subduction rollback in the Banda region (see
the sidebar titled Subduction Rollback) (Spakman & Hall 2010). For a detailed geographic map
of SE Asia and two reconstructions, see Supplemental Figures 1–3. Supplemental Material

3. WESTERN SOUTHEAST ASIA: SUNDALAND

Most of the Sunda Shelf is shallow, with water depths less than 200 m, and its lack of relief has
led to a misconception that it is a stable area. Sundaland has often been described as a shield
or craton (e.g., van Bemmelen 1949, Ben-Avraham & Emery 1973, Hutchison 1989), which is
an idea inherited from geological thinking that predates plate tectonics. Some authors consider
Sundaland to have been a rigid plate in the Cenozoic (e.g., Replumaz & Tapponnier 2003) that
rotated clockwise as a block during the last 8–10 million years (Rangin et al. 1999) or over a longer
period (Replumaz et al. 2004).

3.1. Sundaland: Noncratonic Character

However, the region has been very far from stable, and it cannot have behaved as a single rigid block
during most of the Cenozoic. Geological observations, heat flow, and seismic tomography (Hall

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