"All you have to do is ask AI", sometimes

 Let's follow on this post here about more intriguing geomorphology (land forms underpinned by geology), with a little help from AI in the first instance.

Hungary 

LinkedIn @markku-ylisirniö posted here a cool map of Hungary:

screen grab from original post, click to enlarge 

I commented on his post: 

This is fascinating! I wonder what those striations / lineaments are in the W part of the country? Glacial followed by river erosion along the edge of Quaternary ice sheets, or structural features from underlying strata (tho I don't recall any mountain-building nearby). Must look up geomorphology & geology. Thx!

My late Hungarian geologist dad could have answered this RIP. He had a relief map in my bro's old room I'm currently using (long story):

author photo, click to enlarge

Hence my answer to my comment on LinkedIn:

The geological map shows strata lying EW, so those are likely geomorphology as in glacial or fluvial erosion, to be continued...

 So I ask Perplexity AI (prompt in AI-speak):

reason for geomorphology NS striations in West of green topo map, when geology formations in coloured map run EW

And it obligingly answers before I can blink here, and summarized it:

The north–south stripes on the western topographic map reflect young erosional and structural lineaments—valleys, ridges, and scarps—controlled by neotectonic faults and drainage patterns. In contrast, the coloured geological map shows older, predominantly east–west–trending stratigraphy inherited from the Alpine–Carpathian structural grain.

In Transdanubia, much of the relief is carved into Neogene–Quaternary sediments whose incision does not necessarily follow the strike of the underlying bedrock. Numerous ENE–WSW and NNW–SSE faults have tilted blocks and guided valley orientations, producing the meridional valleys and parallel ridges characteristic of the western Transdanubian Hills.

Rivers and tributaries commonly align with these active or reactivated faults, reinforcing north–south to NNE–SSW drainage. Over time, fluvial incision along these structural lines creates elongated valleys that appear as N–S striations in shaded relief.

Thus, the mismatch between the two maps arises because the geological map highlights older lithostratigraphic boundaries, while the topography expresses younger fault‑controlled and erosion‑driven geomorphology.

Great Lakes 

Likewise @heididaulton posted here an intriguing story about perils of shipping iron ore in the Great Lakes exactly 50 yrs. ago. It had a map of the bottom of Lake Superior, also with NS submarine erosion to the EW geologic fabric of the Canadian Shield it sits on. 

screen grab from original video, click to enlarge

I posted here my thesis area to the E of this. You can see below that the submarine erosion guillies coincide roughly with the arc of the Great Lakes Tectonic zone. It's a pre-Cambrian intra-cratonic volcanic rift system more prone to erosion that the granitic Archean... that's called a shield for a reason! Indeed the Great Lakes were formed after the retreat of the N American inlandsis (continental ice sheet) by a combination of that erosional weak point, as well as the edge of the post-Cambrian limestones laying flat on top southward and ending northward along the Niagara Escarpment (Wikipedia). I combined below the basement map in pastels from a previous blog post here, with the Niagara Escarpment in red from Wikipedia.

Having found no cross-border GIS data, I overlaid them graphically (they were in similar projections)... In fact that's what launched me into GIS exactly 40 yrs. ago (2nd paragraph here):  the geophysics of the Manitoulin Island Discontinuity from Ontario to Wisconsin wasn't traceable for lack cross-border mappable geodata; paper maps didn't match & digital data weren't available then.

QGIS map by author, click to enlarge

You see clearly that not only do the submarine canyons, but also the significant relief below Lake Superior pointed out by @heididaulton, coincide with the arc of the Great Lakes Tectonic Zone in olive: it separates relatively less rugged areas of the Canadian Shield (pre-Cambrian) in grey to the N, inside the other arc of the Niagara Escarpment (post-Cambrian) in red to the S & E, and the Penokean Orogen in purple to the S & W.

Note that the latter includes the Iron Ranges, not only of mining importance opening this section, but also the start of life as we know it per edX MITx on early Paleobiology here.

Another intriguing wrinkle: enlarge the map and see the EW lineament left of the word Mazatzal Terrane at lower right; that may reflect the Manitoulin Island Dicontinuity referred to earlier here.

 ... Same as Bay of Biscay canyons explained here, no AI is needed to sort this one out!

from original post, click to enlarge