Central America Volcanic Arc

[3] These regimes are demarcated roughly by the Costa Rican-Nicaraguan border and can be differentiated by the different tectonic histories of each respective area.

[3] Different types of faults also exist within each regime[3] and further serve to differentiate the northern and southern regions' geologic and tectonic histories from one another.

The magmatic record of Central America begins with Permian-Triassic (~283-215 Ma) granites and gneisses of arc affinity, formed in the western margin of Pangea.

[4] The third pulse includes calc-alkaline volcanism and intrusive rocks ranging from Aptian-Ypresian (~124-50 Ma) present in the continental slivers of the Caribbean plate, the MCOT and the Santa Elena and Nicoya units.

[4] Between the second and third episodes, there are Jurassic-Cretaceous island arc volcanic rocks of paleo-Pacific origin that got accreted into the GSZ and the Mesquito Composite Oceanic Terrane (MCOT).

[4] A fourth pulse is only located in the Talamanca Unit of the Panama plate, of age Maastrichtian-Bartonian (~71-39 Ma), of mainly tholeiitic composition.

[4] The fifth and sixth magmatic pulses (Oligocene-Pliocene and Quaternary) define the CAVA, both parallel to the Middle America Trench.

In short, the interaction of numerous tectonic plates—namely the Cocos, Caribbean, North American, and Coiba[3][11][12] plates—over the past several million years has helped facilitate the continual existence of the Central American Volcanic Arc, influencing the tectonic and broad geologic history of the area.