Dynamic convergent systems along the western margin of the Americas and in the Caribbean provide exceptional natural laboratories to investigate subduction and plate-boundary processes across a wide range of spatial and temporal scales. The boundaries of the Caribbean plate are actively deforming today, generating seismicity, volcanism, and vertical motions that pose significant hazards to densely populated regions. Along the west coast of the Americas, ongoing subduction is similarly associated with active deformation and records a complex long-term history of mountain building, basin evolution, and margin reorganization. This session welcomes contributions addressing short- and long-term subduction and plate-boundary processes, including active deformation, seismicity, magmatism, fluid circulation, deformation partitioning, mantle dynamics, and plate kinematic changes. We particularly encourage studies that integrate present-day observations with the geological and tectonic record, such as investigations of arc initiation and extinction, terrane accretion, collisions, and vertical motions. Contributions employing multidisciplinary approaches are especially encouraged, including geophysics, seismology, geodesy, structural geology, geochronology, geochemistry, and numerical or analogue modeling. Comparative studies linking the Caribbean with other segments of the American convergent margins are also welcome. By bridging regional and process-based perspectives, this session aims to foster dialogue between communities working on active tectonics, geological reconstructions, and geodynamic processes, and to advance our understanding of how subduction systems initiate, evolve, and reorganize through geological time.
Kristin Morell