POTENTIALS OF IRAN’S GEOTOURISM AND STRUCTURE OF MUD VOLCANOES

Geo-tourism is one of the new branches of tourism industry which recently has been highly regarded, and studies the introduction and utilization of the surface geological features in the line with tourism development. In this regard, Iran is a country which has been very apt and has countless attractions and amazing geological diversity andit can attract many tourists and scientific tourists. In the meantime, mud volcanoes as an interesting and surprisinggeomorphological phenomenon can play an important role to geo-tourism development. Mud volcanoes are mainly focused in the continents of Asia, Europe and America and approximately 70% of them are located in Asia and around the Caspian Sea. Most mud volcanoes are located in the coastal province of Sistan & Baluchistan and Golestan, the most important of which are: pirgel, naftelije, borborook, ain and napag. The purpose of this paper isto describe the structure, characteristics, examples of the introduction of mud volcanoes in Iran, and providing guidelines for the development of geo-tourism potential of mud volcanoes. Hence it has been pointed to important instances of mud volcanoes such as: Understand the tectonic situation of the region (faults and subduction), evaluating hydrocarbon gas and oil reservoirs associated with mud volcano, minerals with mud, application in pottery, mud therapy and etc. Also in the line with geo-tourism development of volcanic mud areas, some guidelines are suggested such as: Further studies, development of access road, to create mud therapy centers, Panels help installation, presentation and advertising, to establish residential centers marketplaces, pools of water and mud for amusement and games around mud volcanoes.

Keywords:

Geotourism , Mud volcano in Iran , Mud Therapy , Hydrocarbon gases