Fig. 5: Temporal evolution and formation model for the Euphrates River.
From: Late Miocene Euphrates River drained into a partially desiccated eastern Mediterranean
a, The Late Miocene ancestral Euphrates River initiated on the Anatolian–Eurasian Plates as the Palaeo-Murat and Palaeo-Karasu rivers. At ~3.6 Ma, the Palaeo-Murat River avulsed to the Arabian Plate, with the Palaeo-Karasu River avulsing to join it by ~2.8 Ma. The merged system became the modern Euphrates River by ~1.6 Ma. Before that, the incipient Euphrates River occupied a position to the south. Age control is from volcanics that underlie and are interbedded with fluvial strata (white squares)45,46 and from fault reconstructions (white diamonds denote means, with bars indicating temporal uncertainty ranges; see Fig. 1f–j and Methods). EAF, East Anatolian Fault (~4-Ma reactivation); MSC, Messinian salinity crisis; NAF, North Anatolian Fault (~12-Ma initiation). b–f, Graphical representations of the chronology in a. By the Tortonian (b), the Palaeo-Karasu and Palaeo-Murat rivers terminated at lakes; during the Messinian (c) the systems flowed into the eastern Mediterranean during the kilometre-scale drawdown associated with the terminal phase of the MSC. In the Zanclean (d), the Palaeo-Murat River avulsed to the Arabian Plate due to reactivation of the EAF, while in the Piacenzian (e), the Palaeo-Karasu River avulsed due to decreased slip along the Ovacık Fault (OF). The final diversion of the Euphrates River in the Calabrian (f) is related to either local subsidence or landscape readjustment.
