Events
GAB Distinguished Lecturer - Robert Gastaldo |
Time: Mar 08, 2018 (03:30 PM) |
Location: Haley 2182 |
Details: "Trust but Verify: Do Karoo Basin rocks record the continental expression of the Mother of Mass Extinction?" By Robert Gastaldo, Colby College
Hosted by Dr. Mark Steltenpohl
Abstract: Do Karoo Basin rocks record the continental expression of the Mother of Mass Extinction?
Robert A. Gastaldo, Whipple-Coddington Professor of Geology, Colby College, 5807 Mayflower Hill Drive, Waterville, ME 04901-5807, ragastal@colby.edu
Current models of the terrestrial biosphere’s response to the end-Permian crisis are based largely on lithostratigraphic, magnetostratigraphic, and biostratigraphic records obtained from sedimentary successions in the Karoo Basin, South Africa. These successions have been interpreted to represent continuous sedimentation across the upper Daptocephalus (latest Permian) and lower Lystrosaurus (earliest Triassic) vertebrate-assemblage zones, assigned to the Elandsberg Mbr. and lower Palingkloof Mbr., and upper Palingkloof Mbr. and overlying Katberg Fm., respectively. The stratigraphic section at Old (West) Lootsberg Pass, Eastern Cape Province, is used as a cornerstone for the currently accepted model correlated with the marine extinction event, in part, based on a magnetic polarity stratigraphy of limited documentation. A multidisciplinary effort provides a refined stratigraphic framework, encompassing over 740 m of measured section, compiled from twelve, closely spaced and physically correlated localities, across a northwest to southeast distance of less than 2 km. This framework is placed into magnetostratigraphic context and constrained by two U-Pb ID-TIMS age dates.
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