High-pressure experimental models of geological structures

In order to understand deformation processes that operated in large-scale, natural systems, experimental models can provide a crucial means of developing ideas concerning the interactions of sub-systems. We describe an experimental campaign that was designed to provide new insights into a multi-scale deformation type that involves faulting, uplift and rotation of strong crustal blocks, and the folding of the overlying sequence of layered rocks. The experimental models proved, at a small scale, the existence of a process that could only be inferred at natural scale – namely, the significant lateral flow of a ductile unit that transports the overlying rocks in a nearly passive fashion.