Depositional Record最新文献

Thin tuff beds of the Late Jurassic–Early Cretaceous Bazhenovo Formation are laterally widespread in the central part of the West Siberian Basin (ca 0.5 million km²). However, the source of the tuff beds remains unclear. The stratigraphy, geochemistry and geochronology of the tuff beds were investigated to reveal their magmatic origin and potential source region. Most of the tuff beds are recorded in member 4 and can be correlated through the Bazhenovo sequence. Thin-section petrography and X-ray diffraction indicate that the tuffs mostly comprise clay minerals and K-feldspars. Less common minerals are plagioclase, quartz and pyrite. The geochemical composition of the Bazhenovo tuff beds suggests a parental magma origin of andesite/basalt, which came from volcanic arc-related settings. Considering the results of geochemical studies along with LA-ICP-MS zircon U–Pb dating (141.3 ± 0.3/2.8 Ma), the palaeovolcanoes of the Caucasus region or south-east Mongolia–North-East China are one of the potential source regions of the tuffs. The record of these tuffs indicates the intensive volcanic eruption during the Volgian–Ryazanian, accompanied by a very low-sedimentation rate and preservation in a reducing environment. The tuff beds have broad implications as an isochronous marker horizon and constraints for the numerical age of the Jurassic–Cretaceous boundary in the Boreal Realm.

The French Flemish Coastal Plain, which extends from Denmark to France, is characterised by a topography close to sea level and protected by a system of coastal dunes. Quaternary sediments, comprised of marine, estuarine and continental deposits, accumulated by infilling and then prograding above a network of incised valleys. This study focusses on the Holocene infill of the Denna palaeoestuary, south-west to Dunkerque. Surface geophysics (electrical conductivity and ground-penetrating radar) and vibrocore data are used to reconstruct the landscape evolution during the last stages of sedimentation. The conductivity map highlights the last network of tidal channels, ditches and dikes of the eastern side of the palaeoestuary. Over the upper 4 m of the infill, the ground-penetrating radar profiles show two superimposed units. The bottom unit is composed of meandering channel bars and the top unit of flat strata intersected by sparse channels, mostly infilled in place. The sediment analysis of the vibrocores shows a predominantly sandy filling of marine to estuarine origin, evidenced by sponge spicules and a fauna of bivalves and foraminifera adapted to brackish settings. The uppermost deposit exhibits an oxidation profile which marks the groundwater zone transition. Clayey sediments are also present, infilling the uppermost channels and ditches dug during reclamation, in increasing proportions towards the axis of the estuarine palaeovalley. The tidal signature of sedimentary dynamics is evidenced by heterolithic facies in some channel fills and tidal rhythmites infilling scour depressions linked to dike breaching. The abrupt decrease in channel dynamics across the unit boundary, although sedimentation remained sandy in the upper unit, coincides with the development of embankment of the estuarine border and is tentatively interpreted as a result of reclamation.

Palaeocurrent analysis is vital for basin analysis and helps in the interpretation of depositional environments (along-slope or downslope). For that, it is crucial to have multiple measuring methods at hand to apply palaeocurrent analysis with a wide range of different datasets (outcrops, cores and photographs). Here, two relatively underexploited palaeocurrent measurement techniques are assessed when applied to trough cross-stratification observed in the Arenazzolo Formation at Eraclea Minoa (Sicily). The first technique is a novel design of a qualitative approach to infer palaeocurrent directions from photographs of two-dimensional sedimentary structures. The second technique involves measurements of the anisotropy of magnetic susceptibility from drilled samples. A broad agreement, with overlapping uncertainty boundaries, is observed between results from both techniques. This agreement validates the use of trough cross-strata to infer palaeocurrent directions. Moreover, the addition of photographs improves reproducibility and prevents a bias towards the best-exposed troughs. The application of both techniques to outcrops and sedimentary cores provides new opportunities for palaeocurrent analysis in any type of sedimentary environment.

This paper explores the response to Holocene ash inundation in different sub-environments of two fluvio-lacustrine systems, Las Piedritas and Totoral, focussing on the processes of volcaniclastic remobilisation. Sediment cores and outcrops were used to recognise three deposit types, noting how some differ from lahars, through sedimentological and stratigraphic analysis: (1) thick, laterally discontinuous, pumice-dominated deposits occur overlying alluvial plain and lower terrace surfaces across both watersheds; (2) chaotic, extremely poorly sorted and matrix-supported beds composed of both epiclastic and pyroclastic material occur as two conspicuous deposits at Las Piedritas outcrops, in a low-gradient confined channel setting; and (3) layers with an exclusively pyroclastic composition and no flow sedimentary structures or fragment roundness were found draping each of the two chaotic intervals and intercalating with the background sediment in Las Piedritas prodelta. Thick pumice packages capping the floodplains resulted from the overflow of streams carrying a floating pumice load. Due to its positive buoyancy, the pumice is transported as a slowly moving overlying mantle without mixing with the streamflow. The disorganised pattern and poor sorting of the matrix-rich polymictic beds are consistent with laminar, gravity-driven, high-concentration flows. They constitute secondary lahars, originating upstream from large run-off processes that reworked a pyroclastic substrate. The lack of reworking features in the vitric-rich units identified in the lake core retrieved from Las Piedritas prodelta, as well as the continuous and widespread occurrences of those interbedded in upstream outcrops, indicate an airfall origin. No reworked tephra unit is recognised in the prodelta sediment record, although various deposits from the hydrologic remobilisation of airfall tephra are found along the subaerial portion of both watersheds. Apparently, large amounts of flotation-remobilised tephra were retained on the delta plain, while another considerable fraction would have been carried away from the creek mouth under the influence of dominant regional winds.

A tufa mound developed at La Saline Lake, an oxbow of the Athabasca River in the Athabasca Oil Sands deposit of north-east Alberta, is characterised by an unusual emplacement of a gypsum caprock. This two-tiered architecture resulted from the bicarbonate-saturated groundwater flow along Upper Devonian limestone being redirected deeper and encountering the halite–anhydrite dissolution trend within the underlying Middle Devonian Prairie Evaporite Formation, 175 to 200 m below. Migrations up-section of sulphate-saturated brine resulted in the gypsum caprock on the tufa mound and discharge of a sulphate-saturated brine spring with total dissolved solids of ca 80,000 mg/L. The brine spring is bifurcated with flows to the south-west and north-west. Calcite–gypsum thrombolytic bottom sediments along the south-western branch were covered by a halite deposit and subsequently a gypsum crust with a microbial community dominated by the cyanobacteria Coleofasciculus chthonoplastes. The thrombolite contact zone with the halite–gypsum encrustation has a more diversified community with the cyanobacteria Dactylococcopsis. Cyanobacterial mats that wrap around the bulbous gypsum crust protuberances distributed along the brine pool bottom surfaces have significant eukaryotic diversity, represented by the heterotrophic Ochrophyte Paraphysomonas. In contrast, sediments accumulated along the adjacent spring branch flow to the north-west were thicker and clogged by abundant decomposed and fermented floral debris, unlike the deposit accumulated along the south-western branch. This resulted in an oxygen-depleted anaerobic environment dominated by sulphate-reducing bacteria resulting in a calcite-rich and sulphate-starved anaerobic sediment with ca 20% elemental sulphur and emanation of H₂S gas.

Water discharge and sediment flux variations are important parameters controlling the morphodynamic behaviour of rivers. Although quantitative estimates for water discharge and sediment flux variability are well-constrained for modern rivers, far fewer assessments of flow and sediment flux intermittency in ancient fluvial systems from the rock record are available. In this study, a relationship between water discharge, sediment flux variability and patterns of changing fluvial stratigraphic architecture in the Middle Eocene Escanilla Formation, Spain, is explored. Water discharge intermittency factor (I_WF), calculated as a ratio of the total water discharge (over the averaging time period) to the instantaneous channel-forming water discharge if sustained for the same period, ranges from 0.03 to 0.11 in the high amalgamation intervals and from 0.10 to 0.32 in the low amalgamation intervals. Similarly, the sediment flux intermittency factor (I_SF) is estimated to be in the range of 0.008 to 0.01 in the high amalgamation intervals and of 0.01 to 0.03 in the low amalgamation intervals. Consequently, high amalgamation intervals were most probably deposited under more intermittent and short-lived intense precipitation events while low amalgamation intervals were the result of less intermittent flows spread throughout the year. Overall, these estimates are consistent with values from modern ephemeral rivers typically found in arid to semi-arid climate and is in agreement with available proxy data for the Middle Eocene climatic context of the studied alluvial system. This highlights an important connection between hydroclimate, river morphodynamics and landscape evolution, and has implications to predict river flow and sediment transport across the Earth's surface in the geological past.

The Midcontinent Rift System of North America is one of the oldest continental rifts but rifting ceased before continental breakup. The southern segment of the Midcontinent Rift System lies in Kansas, USA, where the stratigraphic succession and rift evolution are largely unknown. This study analysed the rift basin infill in this part of the Midcontinent Rift System to propose a depositional model. The Precambrian rift succession was described in discontinuous cores drilled in the Texaco Noel Poersch#1 well in Washington County. Sixteen lithofacies were identified and grouped into four different facies associations (fluvial, aeolian, lacustrine and alluvial fan). Overall, the studied succession comprises continental deposits accumulated dominantly in alluvial and aeolian settings, with the intermittent development of lacustrine systems. The proposed depositional models for the available core intervals indicate cyclic patterns of overfilled and underfilled phases within the rift basin. These changes in the accommodation-to-supply ratio were controlled by tectonism and probably modulated by climate during evolution in the syn-rift phase. This study advances our understanding of variations across the Midcontinent Rift System.

Bedded gypsum is relatively common in bedded evaporites associated with red bed siliciclastics of Permo-Triassic Pangea. However, little attention has been paid to the textures of ancient gypsum, which can be used to refine interpretations of depositional environment and diagenetic history. This project describes the textures of bedded gypsum from an outcrop of the Triassic Red Peak Formation (Chugwater Group) near Greybull, Wyoming. Fieldwork, petrography and X-ray diffraction reveal three distinct lithologies of bedded gypsum: bottom-growth gypsum, laminated gypsum and clastic gypsum. Bottom-growth gypsum precipitated at the bottom of shallow saline surface water bodies. Laminated gypsum probably formed in shallow saline lakes and mudflats. Clastic gypsum units are composed of aeolian-reworked bottom-growth gypsum crystals deposited in sandflats. Red siliciclastic mudstones are characterised by their massive nature and abundant blocky peds. Detailed study of this outcrop of the Red Peak Formation shows that it formed in shallow saline lakes and associated mudflats, sandflats and desert soils.

El Niño–Southern Oscillation dynamics affect global weather patterns, with regionally diverse hydrological responses posing critical societal challenges. The lack of seasonally resolved hydrological proxy reconstructions beyond the observational era limits our understanding of boundary conditions that drive and/or adjust El Niño–Southern Oscillation variability. Detailed reconstructions of past El Niño–Southern Oscillation dynamics can help modelling efforts, highlight impacts on disparate ecosystems and link to extreme events that affect populations from the tropics to high latitudes. Here, mid-Holocene El Niño–Southern Oscillation and hydrological changes are reconstructed in the south-west Pacific using a stalagmite from Niue Island, which represents the period 6.4–5.4 ka BP. Stable oxygen and carbon isotope ratios, trace elements and greyscale data from a U/Th-dated and layer counted stalagmite profile are combined to infer changes in local hydrology at sub-annual to multi-decadal timescales. Principal component analysis reveals seasonal-scale hydrological changes expressed as variations in stalagmite growth patterns and geochemical characteristics. Higher levels of host rock-derived elements (Sr/Ca and U/Ca) and higher δ¹⁸O and δ¹³C values are observed in dark, dense calcite laminae deposited during the dry season, whereas during the wet season, higher concentrations of soil-derived elements (Zn/Ca and Mn/Ca) and lower δ¹⁸O and δ¹³C values are recorded in pale, porous calcite laminae. The multi-proxy record from Niue shows seasonal cycles associated with hydrological changes controlled by the positioning and strength of the South Pacific Convergence Zone. Wavelet analysis of the greyscale record reveals that El Niño–Southern Oscillation was continuously active during the mid-Holocene, with two weaker intervals at 6–5.9 and 5.6–5.5 ka BP. El Niño–Southern Oscillation especially affects dry season rainfall dynamics, with increased cyclone activity that reduces hydrological seasonality during El Niño years.

In the Mesozoic succession of the Anyui–Chukotka fold system (North-East Russia), five stratigraphic intervals were recognised that have an abundance of gravity flow deposits. These are the Olenekian (Lower Triassic), Upper Carnian, Upper Norian, Oxfordian–Kimmeridgian and Valanginian. The Triassic gravity flow deposits formed on the south-facing, passive margin of the Chukotka microplate and consist of greywackes and lithic arenites. Palaeocurrent data indicate that the flows were directed towards the south-east. The Olenekian gravity flow units consist of clast-rich sandstone deposited on the continental slope, and clast-poor sandstone deposited at the base of the slope. Upper Carnian mud-poor sandstones were deposited at the base of the slope and the Norian thin-bedded turbidites were upper to mid-slope deposits. The continental margin was affected by tectonism and was uplifted in the latest Triassic–earliest Jurassic, possibly due to the initiation of the southward translation of the Arctic Alaska–Chukotka microplate. Following an Early–Middle Jurassic uplift of the area, sedimentation resumed in the Late Jurassic and earliest Cretaceous. Several syn-orogenic depressions (Rauchua, Pegtymel, Pevek, Myrgovaam and Kytepveem) developed on the south-western margin of the Chukotka microplate, and deposition in these basins included gravity flow deposits at various times. In both the Oxfordian–Kimmeridgian and Valanginian successions, gravity flow deposits included arkosic and subarkosic sandstones with a northern source area of granitoid complexes and deformed Triassic strata. The intervening Tithonian–Berriasian gravity flow deposits consisted mainly of thin-bedded turbidites. These sediments had a southern source, which included a volcanic arc that had accreted to the southern margin of the Chukotka microplate.