Evolving Sediment Structure and Lithospheric Architecture Across the Indo-Burman Forearc Margin From the Joint Inversion of Surface- and Scattered-Wave Seismic Constraints

The Indo-Burman subduction zone represents a global endmember for extreme sediment accretion and is a region characterized by ambiguous tectonic structure. The recent collection of broadband seismic data across the Indo-Burman accretionary margin as part of the Bangladesh-India-Myanmar Array (BIMA) experiment provides an opportunity to investigate the subsurface velocity structure across the incoming plate of an endmember subduction system. We construct a three-dimensional model for seismic shear velocity using a joint inversion of surface- and scattered-wave constraints. Rayleigh-wave phase velocities measured from ambient-noise (12–25 s) and teleseismic earthquakes (20–80 s) constrain absolute shear velocities, while we constrain the locations of and relative contrasts across significant discontinuities in the subsurface using observations from scattered-wave imaging. From the resulting inversion, we observe two model classes that characterize the evolution of consolidation within the markedly slow uppermost sediments and metasediments along a predominantly southwest-to-northeast trend. We interpret variations in deeper seismic structure under two proposed scenarios: (a) a Moho of ∼21–26 km depth underlying a package of metasediments and a thinned basement component, with a slow mantle lithosphere (4.2 km/s) that may contain retained melt from the onset of India-Antarctica seafloor spreading; or (b) a Moho of ∼51–59 km depth underlying a package of metasediments, basement, and a thick slug of mafic material, which may correspond to significant Kerguelen-plume-related underplating. By combining constraints from highly resolved phase-velocity estimates and scattered-wave images, we successfully characterize the lateral transitions across the Indo-Burman forearc margin.