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At least 91 records · Page 5Linked to original sources
USGS2016

A multiagency and multijurisdictional approach to mapping the glacial deposits of the Great Lakes region in three dimensions

The Great Lakes Geologic Mapping Coalition (GLGMC), consisting of state geological surveys from all eight Great Lakes states, the Ontario Geological Survey, and the U.S. Geological Survey, was conceived out of a societal need for unbiased and scientifically defensible geologic information on the shallow subsurface, particularly the delineation, interpretation, and viability of groundwater resources. Only a small percentage (<10%) of the region had been mapped in the subsurface, and there was recognition that no single agency had the financial, intellectual, or physical resources to conduct such a massive geologic mapping effort at a detailed scale over a wide jurisdiction. The GLGMC provides a strategy for generating financial and stakeholder support for three-dimensional (3-D) geologic mapping, pooling of physical and personnel resources, and sharing of mapping and technological expertise to characterize the thick cover of glacial sediments. Since its inception in 1997, the GLGMC partners have conducted detailed surficial and 3-D geologic mapping within all jurisdictions, and concurrent significant scientific advancements have been made to increase understanding of the history and framework of geologic processes. More importantly, scientific information has been provided to public policymakers in understandable formats, emphasis has been placed on training early-career scientists in new mapping techniques and emerging technologies, and a successful model has been developed of state/provincial and federal collaboration focused on geologic mapping, as evidenced by this program's unprecedented and long-term successful experiment of 10 geological surveys working together to address common issues.

GSA Special Papers↗
USGS2016

Geologic history of the Blackbird Co-Cu district in the Lemhi subbasin of the Belt-Purcell Basin

The Blackbird cobalt-copper (Co-Cu) district in the Salmon River Mountains of east-central Idaho occupies the central part of the Idaho cobalt belt—a northwest-elongate, 55-km-long belt of Co-Cu occurrences, hosted in grayish siliciclastic metasedimentary strata of the Lemhi subbasin (of the Mesoproterozoic Belt-Purcell Basin). The Blackbird district contains at least eight stratabound ore zones and many discordant lodes, mostly in the upper part of the banded siltite unit of the Apple Creek Formation of Yellow Lake, which generally consists of interbedded siltite and argillite. In the Blackbird mine area, argillite beds in six stratigraphic intervals are altered to biotitite containing over 75 vol% of greenish hydrothermal biotite, which is preferentially mineralized. Past production and currently estimated resources of the Blackbird district total ~17 Mt of ore, averaging 0.74% Co, 1.4% Cu, and 1.0 ppm Au (not including downdip projections of ore zones that are open downward). A compilation of relative-age relationships and isotopic age determinations indicates that most cobalt mineralization occurred in Mesoproterozoic time, whereas most copper mineralization occurred in Cretaceous time. Mesoproterozoic cobaltite mineralization accompanied and followed dynamothermal metamorphism and bimodal plutonism during the Middle Mesoproterozoic East Kootenay orogeny (ca. 1379–1325 Ma), and also accompanied Grenvilleage (Late Mesoproterozoic) thermal metamorphism (ca. 1200–1000 Ma). Stratabound cobaltite-biotite ore zones typically contain cobaltite 1 in a matrix of biotitite ± tourmaline ± minor xenotime (ca. 1370–1320 Ma) ± minor chalcopyrite ± sparse allanite ± sparse microscopic native gold in cobaltite. Such cobaltite-biotite lodes are locally folded into tight F 2 folds with axial-planar S 2 cleavage and schistosity. Discordant replacement-style lodes of cobaltite 2 -biotite ore ± xenotime 2 (ca. 1320–1270 Ma) commonly follow S 2 fractures and fabrics. Discordant quartz-biotite and quartz-tourmaline breccias, and veins contain cobaltite 3 ± xenotime 3 (ca. 1058–990 Ma). Mesoproterozoic cobaltite deposition was followed by: (1) within-plate plutonism (530–485 Ma) and emplacement of mafic dikes (which cut cobaltite lodes but are cut by quartz-Fe-Cu-sulfide veins); (2) garnet-grade metamorphism (ca. 151–93 Ma); (3) Fe-Cu-sulfide mineralization (ca. 110–92 Ma); and (4) minor quartz ± Au-Ag ± Bi mineralization (ca. 92–83 Ma). Cretaceous Fe-Cu-sulfide vein, breccia, and replacement-style deposits contain various combinations of chalcopyrite ± pyrrhotite ± pyrite ± cobaltian arsenopyrite (not cobaltite) ± arsenopyrite ± quartz ± siderite ± monazite (ca. 144–88 Ma but mostly 110–92 Ma) ± xenotime (104–93 Ma). Highly radiogenic Pb (in these sulfides) and Sr (in siderite) indicate that these elements resided in Mesoproterozoic source rocks until they were mobilized after ca. 100 Ma. Fe-Cu-sulfide veins, breccias, and replacement deposits appear relatively undeformed and generally lack metamorphic fabrics. Composite Co-Cu-Au ore contains early cobaltite-biotite lodes, cut by Fe-Cu-sulfide veins and breccias, or overprinted by Fe-Cu-sulfide replacement-style deposits, and locally cut by quartz veinlets ± Au-Ag ± Bi minerals.

Idaho↗
USGS2020

Deglaciation of the Puget Lowland, Washington

Recently obtained radiocarbon ages from the southern Puget Lowland and reevaluation of limiting ages from the Olympic Peninsula in the light of new light detection and ranging (LiDAR) data suggest that the Juan de Fuca and Puget lobes of the Cordilleran ice sheet reached their maximum extents after 16,000 calibrated yr B.P. Source areas for both lobes fed through a common conduit, likely requiring that downstream responses to changes in either source area were similar. Dates for ice-sheet retreat are sparse and contradictory, but they suggest that retreat was rapid. Depositional and geomorphic evidence shows that retreat of the Juan de Fuca lobe predated retreat of the Puget lobe. No recessional end moraines have been identified in the Puget Lowland, in contrast to numerous recessional end moraines constructed by the Okanogan lobe east of the Cascade Range, and in contrast to later ice-sheet retreat in western Whatcom County north of the Puget Lowland. These observations lead to the hypothesis that collapse of the Juan de Fuca lobe, hastened by the instability of a marine-based ice sheet, steepened the ice-sheet surface over the eastern Strait of Juan de Fuca and diverted ice flow upstream of the Puget lobe to the west. Starved of ice, the Puget lobe retreated quickly.

Washington↗
USGS2022

Magmatism, migrating topography, and the transition from Sevier shortening to Basin and Range extension, western United States

The paleogeographic evolution of the western U.S. Great Basin from the Late Cretaceous to the Cenozoic is critical to understanding how the North American Cordillera at this latitude transitioned from Mesozoic shortening to Cenozoic extension. According to a widely applied model, Cenozoic extension was driven by collapse of elevated crust supported by crustal thicknesses that were potentially double the present ~30–35 km. This model is difficult to reconcile with more recent estimates of moderate regional extension (≤50%) and the discovery that most high-angle, Basin and Range faults slipped rapidly ca. 17 Ma, tens of millions of years after crustal thickening occurred. Here, we integrated new and existing geochronology and geologic mapping in the Elko area of northeast Nevada, one of the few places in the Great Basin with substantial exposures of Paleogene strata. We improved the age control for strata that have been targeted for studies of regional paleoelevation and paleoclimate across this critical time span. In addition, a regional compilation of the ages of material within a network of middle Cenozoic paleodrainages that developed across the Great Basin shows that the age of basal paleovalley fill decreases southward roughly synchronous with voluminous ignimbrite flareup volcanism that swept south across the region ca. 45–20 Ma. Integrating these data sets with the regional record of faulting, sedimentation, erosion, and magmatism, we suggest that volcanism was accompanied by an elevation increase that disrupted drainage systems and shifted the continental divide east into central Nevada from its Late Cretaceous location along the Sierra Nevada arc. The north-south Eocene–Oligocene drainage divide defined by mapping of paleovalleys may thus have evolved as a dynamic feature that propagated southward with magmatism. Despite some local faulting, the northern Great Basin became a vast, elevated volcanic tableland that persisted until dissection by Basin and Range faulting that began ca. 21–17 Ma. Based on this more detailed geologic framework, it is unlikely that Basin and Range extension was driven by Cretaceous crustal overthickening; rather, preexisting crustal structure was just one of several factors that that led to Basin and Range faulting after ca. 17 Ma—in addition to thermal weakening of the crust associated with Cenozoic magmatism, thermally supported elevation, and changing boundary conditions. Because these causal factors evolved long after crustal thickening ended, during final removal and fragmentation of the shallowly subducting Farallon slab, they are compatible with normal-thickness (~45–50 km) crust beneath the Great Basin prior to extension and do not require development of a strongly elevated, Altiplano-like region during Mesozoic shortening.

Nevada↗
USGS2022

Downhill from Austin and Ely to Las Vegas: U-Pb detrital zircon suites from the Eocene–Oligocene Titus Canyon Formation and associated strata, Death Valley, California

In a reconnaissance investigation aimed at interrogating the changing topography and paleogeography of the western United States prior to Basin and Range faulting, a preliminary study made use of U-Pb ages of detrital zircon suites from 16 samples from the Eocene–Oligocene Titus Canyon Formation, its overlying units, and correlatives near Death Valley. The Titus Canyon Formation unconformably overlies Neoproterozoic to Devonian strata in the Funeral and Grapevine Mountains of California and Nevada. Samples were collected from (1) the type area in Titus Canyon, (2) the headwaters of Monarch Canyon, and (3) unnamed Cenozoic strata exposed in a klippe of the Boundary Canyon fault in the central Funeral Mountains. Red beds and conglomerates at the base of the Titus Canyon Formation at locations 1 and 2, which contain previously reported 38–37 Ma fossils, yielded mostly Sierran batholith–age detrital zircons (defined by Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous peaks). Overlying channelized fluvial sandstones, conglomerates, and minor lacustrine shale, marl, and limestone record an abrupt change in source region around 38–36 Ma or slightly later, from more local, Sierran arc–derived sediment to extraregional sources to the north. Clasts of red radiolarian-bearing chert, dark radiolarian chert, and quartzite indicate sources in the region of the Golconda and Roberts Mountains allochthons of northern Nevada. Sandstones intercalated with conglomerate contain increasing proportions of Cenozoic zircon sourced from south-migrating, caldera-forming eruptions at the latitude of Austin and Ely in Nevada with maximum depositional ages (MDAs) ranging from 36 to 24 Ma at the top of the Titus Canyon Formation. Carbonate clasts and ash-rich horizons become more prevalent in the overlying conglomeratic Panuga Formation (which contains a previously dated 15.7 Ma ash-flow tuff). The base of the higher, ash-dominated Wahguyhe Formation yielded a MDA of 14.4 Ma. The central Funeral Mountains section exposes a different sequence of units that, based on new data, are correlative to the Titus Canyon, Panuga, and Wahguyhe Formations at locations 1 and 2. An ash-flow tuff above its (unexposed) base provided a MDA of 34 Ma, and the youngest sample yielded a MDA of 12.7 Ma. The striking differences between age-correlative sections, together with map-based evidence for channelization, indicate that the Titus Canyon Formation and overlying units likely represent fluvial channel, floodplain, and lacustrine deposits as sediments mostly bypassed the region, moving south toward the Paleogene shoreline in the Mojave Desert. The profound changes in source regions and sedimentary facies documented in the Titus Canyon Formation took place during ignimbrite flareup magmatism and a proposed eastward shift of the continental divide from the axis of the Cretaceous arc to a new divide in central Nevada in response to thermal uplift and addition of magma to the crust. This uplift initiated south-flowing fluvial systems that supplied sediments to the Titus Canyon Formation and higher units.

Arizona, California, Nevada, Utah↗
USGS2022

Tephrochronology of the Miocene Monterey and Modelo Formations, California

Tuff beds have been known in the Miocene Monterey and Modelo Formations since the initial descriptions; however, age control and correlation is predominantly biostratigraphy. Here we combine tephrochronology and biostratigraphy in order to provide numerical age control for eight sedimentary sequences of the Monterey and Modelo Formations from Monterey, California to Orange County, California. We correlate 38 tuffs and tephra beds in the Monterey and Modelo Formations to 26 different dated tuffs found mainly in non-marine sequences in Nevada, Idaho and New Mexico. We also include geochemical data for an additional 19 tuffs in the Monterey and Modelo Formations for which there are no known correlative tuffs and geochemical data for 11 additional tuffs in other units that will add to the Miocene tephrostratigraphy. The identified tuffs range in age from 16 to 7 Ma with 31 tuffs erupted from volcanic centers of the Snake River Plain of northern Nevada to eastern Idaho. Twelve other tuffs erupted from the Southern Nevada Volcanic Field, one from the Sonoma Volcanic Field, north of San Francisco, and the eruptive source of 12 other tuffs is uncertain. These tuffs provide useful correlations of marine sequences deposited at varying depths along offshore Miocene California and possible insight into the distribution of air-fall tephra from so-called super eruptions

GSA Special Papers↗
USGS1982

Iridium abundance measurements across the Cretaceous/Tertiary boundary in the San Juan and Raton Basins of northern New Mexico

During the past year we have been measuring trace element abundances and searching for anomalously high iridium (Ir) concentrations in continental sedimentary rocks that span the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary in the Raton and San Juan Basins of northern New Mexico and southern Colorado. Using neutron activation and radiochemical separations, we have identified anomalous concentrations of Ir in samples from two sites in the Raton Basin: in a drill core at York Canyon, about 50 km west of Raton, New Mexico, and in a road cut near the city of Raton. In both cases the anomaly occurs essentially at the base of thin coal beds, across a thickness span of only a few cm and at the same level at which several species of Cretaceous pollen become extinct and the ratio of angiosperm pollen to fern spores drops sharply. The Ir surface density ranges from 8 to 40 × 10 −9 g cm −2 . In the York Canyon core the Ir concentration reaches a value of 5.6 × 10 −9 g/g of rock over a local background of about 10 −11 g/g; the Pt abundance distribution is similar to that for Ir, while Au reaches its maximum concentration about 10 cm below the Ir peak. Se, V, Cr, Mn, Co, and Zn are about two-fold more abundant at the anomaly zone than in adjacent zones, and mass spectrometric 244 Pu analysis showed the 244 Pu/Ir atom ratio ⩽ 1 × 10 7 . In the San Juan Basin we have located a small Ir spike (55 × 10 −12 g/g over a local background of 8 × 10 −12 g/g) that is accompanied by high concentrations of Co and Mn. It is thought to be due to geochemical enrichment processes.

Colorado, New Mexico↗
USGS1984

Late Devonian icriodontid biofacies models and alternate shallow-water conodont zonation

Recognition of differences in the habitats, apparatuses, and ranges of Late Devonian Icriodus and Pelekysgnathus permits refinement of their biofacies interpretations and construction of an alternate icriodontid zonation. Icriodus is a euphotic genus that predominated in most environments during the early Late Devonian (Frasnian) but died out during the early Famennian. Its apparatus consists of platform (I) elements; four larger, acodiniform cones; and two smaller, oneotodiform, scolopodiform, or drepanodiform cones. Pelekysgnathus is a shallow-water genus, which shortly after Icriodus died out, produced somewhat deeper water taxa with triple-rowed I elements that are homeomorphs of Icriodus I elements. Apparatuses for both single-rowed taxa ( Pelekysgnathus ) and triple-rowed taxa ( “Icriodus”) contain oistodiform cones, apparently in place of one or more of the acodiniform cones. Biofacies models for southern Belgium and Utah show that Icriodus lived not only in nearshore environments but ranged into the pelagic palmatolepid-bispathodid (I) and palmatolepid-polygnathid (II) biofacies. Younger “Icriodus”, however, inhabited mainly the deeper subtidal polygnathid-“icriodid” (III) and polygnathid-pelekysgnathid (IV) biofacies. Pelekysgnathus inhabited mainly the polygnathid-pelekysgnathid biofacies and ranged shoreward into the shallow-subtidal clydagnathid (V), scaphignathid (VI), patrognathid (VII), and pandorinellinid (VIII) biofacies, but has not yet been found in the hypersaline antognathid (IX) biofacies (new). The Late Devonian, subdivided by 28 mainly Palmatolepis -based zones from the Lower (Polygnathus) asymmetricus to Upper (Siphonodella) praesulcata Zones in the standard conodont zonation for pelagic biofacies, can be subdivided into nine icriodontid-based zones in nearshore biofacies. In ascending order, these are the Icriodus symmetricus; Lower and Upper Pelekysgnathus planus; Lower, Middle, and Upper “ I .” cornutus ; and Lower, Middle, and Upper “ I .” costatus Zones. Taxonomic revisions involve mainly relegating several previously described species to subspecies and morphotypes and raising some subspecies to species. Two new biostratigraphically significant subspecies, I. iowaensis ancylus n. subsp. and I. alternatus helmsi n. subsp., are recognized to occur both in the western United States and in Europe. Pelekysgnathus brevis n. sp. is described as new on the basis of a Middle Devonian occurrence in Utah.

Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, New Mexico, Nevada, Utah↗
USGS1985

Rate and depth of pedogenic-carbonate accumulation in soils: Formation and testing of a compartment model.

The rate and depth of pedogenic carbonate accumulation in soils formed in Quaternary alluvium may be viewed as a theoretical problem that involves the mutual interaction of several independent and dependent soil-forming variables. We propose a model for carbonate accumulation in which the soil column is defined by a vertical sequence of 1-cm 2 -area compartments, each with a specified texture, bulk density, water-holding content, lithologic and mineralogic composition, soil-air pCO 2 , ionic strength, and temperature. On the basis of these data, rates of carbonate solubility and dissolution within a given compartment are determined. In arkosic to lithic arkosic sandy parent materials, high carbonate solubility (0.137 to 0.212 mg/ml) and the large reactive surface area of eolian calcareous dust result in rapid carbonate dissolution (0.79 to 9.92 × 10 −10 g/cm 2 /sec) that promotes rapid translocation of carbonate by infiltrating water. We derive a group of equations and use them to calculate net carbonate depletion or accumulation in a soil compartment over an interval of time as a function of the independent variables temperature and precipitation. These two variables largely determine or strongly influence soil-water balance, the external carbonate influx rate, and carbonate solubility. The carbonate distribution that our model predicts closely resembles the observed carbonate distribution in soils associated with Holocene deposits forming in arid, hyperthermic to xeric, thermic moisture-temperature regimes in southern California. This modeling indicates that with a mean carbonate influx rate of 1 × 10 −4 g/cm 2 /yr and in a semiarid, thermic climate, the maximum depression of the top of the Cca horizon is attained within only a few thousand years. In contrast, given the same influx rate, our model predicts that a noncalcareous B horizon cannot form in an arid, hyperthermic climate, a conclusion supported by field and laboratory studies of calcic soils in this climate. The influence of glacial-to-interglacial climatic changes on carbonate accumulation can be modeled by calculating latest Pleistocene soil-water balance with the aid of published estimates of full-glacial temperature and precipitation. On the basis of these modeling results, we propose that either of two types of glacial-to-interglacial climatic changes may account for the strongly bimodal, apparently polygenetic carbonate distribution that is observed in late Pleistocene soils of the eastern Mojave Desert of southern California. Such results of compartment-strategy modeling are encouraging and indicate the great potential of combined theoretical and empirical methods for considering pedological problems of interest to Quaternary geologists.

GSA Special Papers↗
USGS1987

Dinosaurs, pollen and spores, and the age of the Ojo Alamo Sandstone, San Juan Basin, New Mexico

The Ojo Alamo Sandstone of the San Juan Basin of New Mexico is composed of interbedded conglomeratic sandstone, sandstone, siltstone, and mudstone. Conglomerates are found in the western part of the basin; siliceous pebbles diminish in size both southward and eastward across the basin, becoming rare to nonexistent in the eastern part. There is great variation in the internal stratigraphy of the Ojo Alamo: Individual sandstone or mudstone beds thicken, thin, and pinch out laterally. The thickness of the Ojo Alamo varies from 6 m (20 ft) to more than 122 m (400 ft). The formation varies in composition from one to as many as five sandstone beds with interbeds of siltstone or mudstone. Dinosaur bone has been found within the Ojo Alamo at several sites in the western part of the basin. Paleocene pollen has been found within the Ojo Alamo in the eastern part of the basin. To date, no Cretaceous pollen has been found at or above the stratigraphic level of dinosaur bone within the Ojo Alamo Sandstone. Near Barrel Spring, in the southwest part of the basin, both dinosaur bone and Paleocene pollen have been found. One bone, found at the top of the Ojo Alamo, was loose on the surface, and its significance is therefore equivocal. Dinosaur bone, however, has also been found in place in the upper part of the Ojo Alamo about 1.6 km (1 mi) west of Barrel Spring, at about the same stratigraphic level as Paleocene pollen from a site just east of Barrel Spring. Because there is no apparent unconformity between the highest in-place bone level and the Paleocene pollen level in this area, the Ojo Alamo dinosaurs, if not reworked, are Paleocene in age at this site and probably throughout the San Juan Basin.

Colorado, New Mexico↗
USGS1987

The ages of the continental, Upper Cretaceous, Fruitland Formation and Kirtland Shale based on a projection of ammonite zones from the Lewis Shale, San Juan Basin, New Mexico and Colorado

The Kirtland Shale or Fruitland Formation directly underlies the Cretaceous-Tertiary boundary throughout most of the San Juan Basin of northwest New Mexico and southwest Colorado. These formations have been known to be Late Cretaceous in age since the early 1900s. Now, with the greatly renewed interest in rocks adjacent to mass extinction boundaries, it is important to place more precise ages on such rock units as the Fruitland and Kirtland. Deposition of the Fruitland and Kirtland was closely related to deposition of the underlying marine-regressive Pictured Cliffs Sandstone. Because the Pictured Cliffs was deposited as a strandline sandstone in a subsiding seaway, its stratigraphic expression, when related to a time horizon (the Huerfanito Bentonite Bed), is a series of rising-to-the-northeast, time transgressive, stair steps. Thus, time lines (or horizons) drawn parallel to the Huerfanito cut through the marine Lewis Shale, the strandline Pictured Cliffs Sandstone, and the continental Fruitland Formation and Kirtland Shale. Ammonites have been collected and identified from various stratigraphic levels within the Lewis Shale around the northwest, north, and east sides of the San Juan Basin. These fossils can be tied in to the established ammonite zonation of the Western Interior seaway. Because some of these ammonite zones have been radiometrically dated outside the San Juan Basin, it is possible to project these dated faunal zones from the Lewis Shale along time lines into the Fruitland Formation and Kirtland Shale and thereby estimate the age of those rocks. Based on these projections the part of the Fruitland and Kirtland laterally time-equivalent to the Lewis Shale is estimated to range from 73.2 ± 0.7 Ma to 73.9 ± 0.8 Ma. The average age for this interval based on these dates is 73.5 ± 0.5 Ma; the maximum range of the interval at the 95 percent confidence level is 71.8 to 75.5 Ma. This age range puts these rocks in the Campanian Stage of the upper Cretaceous in the San Juan Basin.

Colorado, New Mexic↗
USGS1986

The non-transferability of a Cretaceous coal model in the San Juan Basin of New Mexico and Colorado

The San Juan Basin of northwest New Mexico and southwest Colorado contains several Upper Cretaceous coal-bearing formations. The coals in these formations were deposited in environments associated with repeated transgressions and regressions of the Western Interior seaway in Late Cretaceous time. A detailed subsurface and surface study of the coal beds in one of these units, the Fruitland Formation, formed the basis for a coal-depositional model (Fassett and Hinds, 1971). This model basically shows that the thickest Fruitland coals formed landward of thickly stacked sandstone beds of the regressive-marine Pictured Cliffs Sandstone. Transferability of the Fruitland coal model was tested by comparing it to another San Juan Basin coal-bearing rock unit, the lower Menefee Formation. Lower Menefee coal deposits were formed in association with the Point Lookout Sandstone, an older regressive-marine unit. The purpose of this comparison was to see if thick lower Menefee coal beds were also concentrated adjacent to thick vertical shoreface-sandstone buildups. This comparison showed that even though thick sandstone buildups were found in the Point Lookout, no thick coal beds were found in the lower Menefee Formation adjacent to them. This test suggests that certain coal depositional models may have limited value as predictive tools and must be used with caution by coal explorationists. Even more importantly, potential coal-bearing areas should never be written off simply because they do not fit a previously described model.

Colorado, New Mexico↗
USGS1988

Amino-acid diagenesis and its implication for late Pleistocene lacustrine sediment, Clear Lake, California

The diagenesis of amino acids in sediments from Clear Lake core CL-80-1 is indicated by changes in amino acid concentrations, compositions, and stereochemistry. Concentrations of total amino acids decrease with depth, but the decrease is not systematic, possibly reflecting a nonuniformity in sedimentary and postdepositional processes affecting the amino acids. Ratios of neutral/acidic amino acids may indicate that the pH of interstitial water is slightly alkaline to slightly acidic and that the organic matter is well humified. Ratios of nonprotein/protein amino acids suggest that some changes in amino acids with depth result from microbial degradations. The extent of racemization of alanine increases with depth; the trends of these data may be explained, in part, by rapid sedimentation within the lake. Agreement between extents of alanine racemization for sediments from equivalent depths in two cores from the lake suggests that diagenetic temperatures are uniform within the sediments of the northern basin of Clear Lake.

California↗
USGS1988

Depositional environments of the Cache, Lower Lake, and Kelseyville Formations, Lake County, California

We describe the depositional environments of the Cache, Lower Lake, and Kelseyville Formations in light of habitat preferences of recovered mollusks, ostracodes, and diatoms. Our reconstruction of paleoenvironments for these late Cenozoic deposits provides a framework for an understanding of basin evolution and deposition in the Clear Lake region. The Pliocene and Pleistocene Cache Formation was deposited primarily in stream and debris flow environments; fossils from fine-grained deposits indicate shallow, fresh-water environments with locally abundant aquatic vegetation. The fine-grained sediments (mudstone and siltstone) were probably deposited in ponds in abandoned channels or shallow basins behind natural levees. The abandoned channels and shallow basins were associated with the fluvial systems responsible for deposition of the bulk of the technically controlled Cache Formation. The Pleistocene Lower Lake Formation was deposited in a water mass large enough to contain a variety of local environments and current regimes. The recovered fossils imply a lake with water depths of 1 to 5 m. However, there is strong support from habitat preferences of the recovered fossils for inferring a wide range of water depths during deposition of the Lower Lake Formation; they indicate a progressively shallowing system and the culmination of a desiccating lacustrine system. The Pleistocene Kelseyville Formation represents primarily lacustrine deposition with only minor fluvial deposits around the margins of the basin. Local conglomerate beds and fossil tree stumps in growth position within the basin indicate occasional widespread fluvial incursions and depositional hiatuses. The Kelseyville strata represent a large water mass with a muddy and especially fluid substrate having permanent or sporadic periods of anoxia. Central-lake anoxia, whether permanent or at irregular intervals, is the simplest way to account for the low numbers of benthic organisms recovered from the Kelseyville Formation. Similar low-oxygen conditions for benthic life are represented throughout the sedimentary history of Clear Lake. Water depths for the Kelseyville Formation of 10 to 30 m and 12 m near the margins of the basin are inferred both before and after fluvial incursions. These water-depth fluctuations cannot be correlated with major climatic changes as indicated by pollen and fossil leaves and cones; they may be due to faulting in this technically active region.

GSA Special Papers↗
USGS1988

Large-scale bedforms in boulder gravel produced by giant waves in Hawaii

Approximately 105,000 yr ago (based on uranium-series dating), waves in a giant wave train swept up to an elevation of about 375 m on the island of Lanai. The waves deposited the Hulopoe Gravel, which near the present shoreline consists of basalt boulders, coral fragments, and calcareous beachrock slabs, and near the upper limit of the deposit consists of sand and shell fragments. The maximum heights of similar but lower deposits on nearby islands, when adjusted for their estimated subsidence due to volcanic loading during the past 105,000 yr, indicate that the source of the wave was about 50 km southwest of Lanai. We hypothesize that failure and downward movement of the huge Lanai submarine landslide created an ocean disturbance, which produced waves that rushed across the Lanai reef and beach, picked up limestone and lava fragments, and deposited them high on the island as the Hulopoe Gravel. Backwash from the waves stripped soil and rock from the islands and carried much of it to the sea. The Hulopoe Gravel is 8 m thick in a gulch 200 m inland from the Lanai shoreline, where it consists of three beds, successively, 2, 4, and 2 m thick. These beds are considered to have been laid down by successive waves in the wave train. Each bed consists of two units: a lower unit of basalt and limestone boulders, cobbles, and sand, and an upper bimodal unit of large basalt boulders with a pebbly sand matrix. These subunits are inferred to be deposited from the runup and backwash of each wave. At the upper surface of the Hulopoe Gravel, basalt boulders averaging 0.5 m in diameter are arranged in dunelike ridges about 1 m high and 10 m apart. Nearby, where young streams have cut into and exposed the lower beds of the Hulopoe, clasts at the boundaries between the beds are locally imbricated and dip landward. We interpret these features as aspects of torrential flow and crossbedding created during the high-speed backwash of the great waves.

Hawaii↗
USGS1989

Slope movements triggered by heavy rainfall, November 3–5, 1985, in Virginia and West Virginia, U.S.A.

Study of slope movements triggered by the storm of November 3–5, 1985, in the central Appalachian Mountains, U.S.A., has helped to define the meteorologic conditions leading to slope movements and the relative importance of land cover, bedrock, surficial geology, and geomorphology in slope movement location. This long-duration rainfall at moderate intensities triggered more than 1,000 slope movements in a 1,040-km 2 study area. Most were shallow slips and slip-flows in thin colluvium and residuum on shale slopes. Locations of these failures were sensitive to land cover and slope aspect but were relatively insensitive to topographic setting. A few shallow slope movements were triggered by the same rainfall on interbedded limestone, shale, and sandstone. Several large debris slide-avalanches were triggered in sandstone regolith high on ridges in areas of the highest measured rainfall. Most of these sites were on slopes that dip 30 to 35° and lie parallel to bedding planes, presumably the sites of least stability.

Virginia, West Virginia↗
USGS1990

Geology, geophysics, and geochronology of the Manson impact structure

A problem with the impact hypothesis for the Cretaceous/Tertiary (K/T) mass extinction is the apparent absence of an identifiable impact site. The Manson impact structure is a candidate site because of its size (the largest such structure recognized in the United States); in addition, the largest and most abundant shocked quartz grains at the K/T boundary are found relatively close by, and its age is indistinguishable from that of the K/T boundary. The region of northwest central Iowa that contains the Manson impact structure is covered by Quaternary glacial deposits, which are underlain by Phanerozoic sedimentary rocks (mostly flat-lying carbonates) and Proterozoic red clastic, metamorphic, volcanic, and plutonic rocks. In a circular area about 22 mi (35 km) in diameter around Manson, Iowa, this normal sequence is absent or “disturbed.” Within the structure, three roughly concentric zones of rock associations have been identified: an outer zone of displaced strata, a zone of completely disrupted strata, and a central area in which basement igneous and metamorphic rocks have been uplifted at least 1,220 ft (4,000 m). Gravity, magnetic, and seismic refraction surveys readily identify the central uplift within the structure. Manson is established as an impact structure based on its circular shape, its central uplift, and the presence of shocked quartz within the granitic central uplift. Paleontological evidence, a fission track age, and preliminary 40 Ar/ 39 Ar dating all allowed a K/T boundary age for the Manson structure. Improved 40 Ar/ 39 Ar age spectra may be interpreted in terms of samples that were incompletely degassed during heating due to the Manson impact. An age of 65.7 ± 1.0 Ma was obtained, a value indistinguishable from that of the K/T boundary.

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