CONTINENTAL ECLOGITES AND THE WILSON CYCLE

The Wilson Cycle, the repeated opening and closing of oceans, commonly along roughly the same lines, is here attributed to the presence of e clogite-facies roots of partially collapsed orogens. We present a fini te-element thermal model that suggests that such roots will weaken the orogenic lithosphere relative to that of the adjacent foreland for hu ndreds of millions of years and make it a preferred sire for later rif ting.