Families of salt domes in the Gulf Coastal Province

The theory of Rayleigh-Taylor instability is used to study the distribution of salt domes in the Gulf Coastal Province. The model shows that (1) the spacing of salt domes about an initial disturbance depends on mother salt thickness and viscosity ratio of overlying sediment to salt; (2) domes not only grow upward from the initial disturbance, but are also triggered in the vicinity of the primary disturbance, forming a family of incipient domes with regular pattern; (3) the family of incipient domes develops out of the initial disturbance starting at the location of maximum instability and spreading radially. Several numerical examples provide a framework for examining the disturbance of Gulf Coast salt domes.