Three radiolarian fauna, aged as the Middle-Late Triassic, Late Jurassic-Early Creta- ceous and Cretaceous radiolarian fauna, have been recognised in the radiolarian cherts from the middle sector of the Yarlung Zangbo suture zone, southern Tibet, China. The average contents of SiO2 in the radiolarian cherts of the Middle-Late Triassic and Late Jurassic-Early Cretaceous are 90.24% and 92.58% respectively, with average ratios of Al/(Al+Fe+Mn) as 0.75 and 0.74 respectively, the average ratios of MnO/TiO2 as 0.36 and 1.24, the average ratios of Ce/Ce* as 1.15 and 1.03, and the average ratios of LaN/CeN as 0.85 and 0.93. These geochemical features indicate that both of them are biogenic, deposited in a continental margin basin. The SiO2 content of the Early Cretaceous radiolarian chert is 94.12%, with the ratio of Al/(Al+Fe+Mn) as 0.59, ratio of MnO/TiO2 as 4.30, ratio of Ce/Ce* as 0.60, ratio of LaN/CeN as 1.59, which imply that the chert is biogenic and was deposited in a pelagic basin. The Middle-Late Triassic association of the radiolarian chert and turbidites as well as their geochemical characteristics indicates the existence of a strong rifting marginal basin in the belt of the Yarlung Zangbo River then. The association of radiolarian chert and bedded basalt indicate an initial Tethyan ocean basin in southern Tibet during the Late Jurassic-Early Cretaceous. The early Cretaceous radiolarian chert coexisting with pillow basalt in top of the ophiolite suite represents sediments from the oceanic Tethyan basin.
ZHU Jie1,2, DU Yuansheng1, LIU Zaoxue2, FENG Qinglai1, TIAN Wangxue2, LI Jinping2 & WANG Changping2 1. Faculty of Earth Sciences,China University of Geology, Wuhan 430074, China
The Sydney-Bowen basin in eastern Australia is an elongate back arc-converted foreland basin system situated between the Lachlan Fold Belt in the west and the New England Fold Belt in the east. The Middle Permian Wandrawandian Siltstone at Warden Head near Ulla- dulla in the southern Sydney Basin is dominated by fossiliferous siltstone and mudstone, with a large amount of dropstones and minor pebbly sandstone beds. Two general types of deposits are recognized from the siltstone unit in view of the timing and mechanism of formation. One is rep- resented by the primary deposits from offshore to subtidal environments with abundant drop- stones of glacial marine origin. The second type is distinguished by secondary, soft-sediment deformational deposits and structures, and comprises three layers of mudstone dykes of seismic origin. In the latter type, metre scale, laterally extensive syn-depositional slump deformation structures occur in the middle part of the Wandrawandian Siltstone. The deformation structures vary in morphology and pattern, including large-scale complex-type folds, flexural stratification, concave-up structures, faulting of small displacements accompanied by folding and brecciation. The slumps and associated syn-sedimentary structures are attributed to penecontemporaneous deformations of soft sediments (mostly silty mud) formed as a result of mass movement of un- consolidated and/or semi-consolidated substrate following an earthquake event. The occurrence of the earthquake event deposits supports the current view that the Sydney Basin was located in a back-arc setting near the New England magmatic arc on an active continental margin during the Middle Permian.
DU Yuansheng1, G. R. Shi1,2 & GONG Yiming1 1. Faculty of Earth Sciences, China University of Geosciences, Wuhan 430074, China
