Cycles and stacking patterns in carboniferous rocks of the Black Warrior Foreland Basin
- Geological Survey of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL (United States)
Stratigraphic data from the Black Warrior Basin provide a robust basis for testing the influence of tectonics and climate on cyclicity in a foreland basin. The basin fill comprises carbonate-bearing Chester-type and coal-bearing Pottsville-type depositional cycles, and the composition, frequency, and stacking patterns of those cycles reflect dynamically interwoven tectonic and climate factors. Deformational loading evidently gave rise to flexural movements that determined cycle stacking patterns by controlling spatial and temporal variation of subsidence rate. Evolving tectonic highlands, moreover, provided shifting sources of terrigenous clastic sediment, thereby affecting stratal geometry. The transition from carbonate- to coal-bearing cycles reflects drift of southeastern North America into the humid equatorial belt. Change of average cycle duration from 1.1. to less than 0.5 m.y. corresponds to Gondwana glaciation, suggesting significant climatic forcing.
- DOE Contract Number:
- FG22-90BC14448
- OSTI ID:
- 45209
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-941065-; TRN: 95:001437-0032
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: 44. annual convention of the Gulf Coast Association of Geological Societies and the 41st annual convention of the Gulf Coast Section of the Society of Economic Paleontologists and Mineralogists, Austin, TX (United States), 5-7 Oct 1994; Other Information: PBD: 1994; Related Information: Is Part Of Gulf Coast Association of Geological Societies: Transactions. Volume 44; Major, R.P. [ed.]; PB: 847 p.
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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