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Abstract: In the Balmuccia massif (NW Italy), a pseudotachylyte vein network (N068 trending) in a spinel lherzolite is interpreted as the product of frictional melting during a single Mw > 6 earthquake. The subvertical fault underwent a metric dextral coseismic displacement, raking 60°SW. The average width of the main slip surface is ~ 5 mm. A dense network of thin (20–200 μm) injection and ultramylonite‐like veins decorates the fault walls. In the injection veins, Raman microspectrometry mapping reveals pockets of still preserved amorphous silicate, containing ≈ 1% of structurally bound H2O. In the ultramylonite‐like veins, electron backscattered diffraction mapping reveals that ultrafine (0.2–2 μm) olivine grains exhibit a strong fabric with (010) planes parallel to shearing, consistent with temperatures above 1250°C during deformation and suggesting fast recrystallization from the frictional melt. The veins also exhibit pyroxene and recrystallized spinel, which proves that the earthquake occurred at a minimum depth of 40 km. The energy balance demonstrates that complete fault lubrication must have occurred during coseismic sliding (i.e., dynamic friction coefficient ≪ 0.1). Because of the low viscosity of slightly hydrated ultramafic liquids (≈ 1 Pa·s), we argue that lubrication was only transient, as the melt could rapidly flow into tensile fractures, which led to rapid cooling and promoted strength recovery and sliding arrest. Combined together, our observations suggest that this pseudotachylyte is the frozen record of a deep (>40 km) earthquake of 6 < Mw < 7. Its focal mechanism is deduced from the crystal preferred orientation due to late coseismic creep in ultramylonite‐like veins and deciphered by electron backscattered diffraction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We report a new type of ultramafic pseudotachylyte that forms a fault- and injection-vein network hosted in the mantle-derived Balmuccia peridotite (Italy). In the fault vein the pseudotachylyte is now deformed and recrystallized into a spinel-lherzolite facies ultramylonite, made of a fine (<2 μm) aggregate of olivine, orthopyroxene, clinopyroxene, and spinel, with small amounts of amphibole and dolomite. Electron backscattered diffraction study of the ultramylonite shows a clear crystallographic preferred orientation (CPO) of olivine. The fault vein pseudotachylyte overprints a spinel-lherzolite facies amphibole-bearing mylonite, indicating that shear localization accompanying chemical reaction had taken place in the peridotite before seismic slip produced frictional melting. The occurrence of amphibole in the host mylonite and that of dolomite as well as amphibole in the matrices of ultramylonite and pseudotachylyte may indicate that fluid was present and had evolved in its composition from H2O-rich to CO2-rich during ductile deformation with metamorphic reactions, which may account for the observed rheological transition from ductile to brittle behavior. The spinel-lherzolite facies assemblage in mylonites, P-T estimations from pyroxene geothermometry and carbonate reactions, and the type of olivine CPO in deformed pseudotachylyte indicate that both the preseismic and the postseismic ductile deformations occurred at ∼800 °C and 0.7-1.1 GPa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]