The influence of the evolution of structural highs in alluvial successions: examples from the Ediacaran and from the Cambrian of the Camaquã Basin (Southern Brazil)

Author(s)

Andre Marconato

• Document type: Master's Dissertation
• Press: São Paulo.
• Institution: Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Instituto de Geociências (IG/BT)
• Defense date: 2010-04-30

Examining board members

Renato Paes de Almeida; Paulo Sergio Gomes Paim; Andre Oliveira Sawakuchi

• Advisor: Renato Paes de Almeida

Abstract

Sedimentary provenance is generally used aiming the reconstruction of the relations between sedimentary deposits and their source areas, in order to interpret the regional tectonic setting. An application that is less frequent in sedimentary provenance analysis is the detailed assessment of the changes in the source areas during the infilling history of a sedimentary basin and of the local variation of the provenance data in specific stratigraphic intervals. Such studies can result in important inferences concerning the configuration of adjacent structural highs, as well as information about tectonic events that are capable of changing the drainage network feeding the sedimentary basin. In the Camaquã Basin (RS) the Santa Bárbara and Guaritas groups register events of syn-sedimentary movement of structural highs, which caused the segmentation of the basin into sub-basins. The Santa Bárbara Group comprises siliciclastic successions distributed in three sub-basins separated by the Caçapava do Sul and Serra das Encantadas structural highs. The western sub-basin contains alluvial sandstones and conglomerates, siltstones and sandstones of fluvial and lacustrine environments, and alluvial fan conglomerates, disposed in a initial retrogradatinoal cycle, and two overlying progradational cycles, which are separated by a abrupt flooding surface. In the central sub-basin, the Santa Bárbara Group comprises a siltstone and sandstone succession with conglomerates at its base, followed by alluvial fan conglomeratic deposits in the middle part of the sedimentary succession, which in turn is succeeded by another succession of siltstones and sandstones at the top of the group. The Guaritas Group shows braided river deposits both at the base and the top of the unit, with interfingering of eolian, braided river and alluvial fan systems in the intermediate part of the succession. The deposits of the Santa Bárbara Group in the western sub-basin were investigated in detail through systematic studies of provenance both at the outcrop scale and in thin sections and by detrital zircon isotope analysis. The results show distinct source areas for the alluvial deposits of the base and the top of the unit, with a local sources for both of them. The lower deposits had source areas to the west and southwest of the basin, while the upper ones had source areas to the east of the basin, on the Caçapava do Sul High, suggesting a change in the configuration of the source areas, with its onset corresponding to the first conglomeratic level of the intermediate alluvial succession of the Santa Bárbara Group. The provenance data also shows that there is no significant lateral displacement deposits relative to their source areas, suggesting that the main displacement of the border faults was normal, as expected for rift basins. The sedimentary successions of the Santa Bárbara Group in the central sub-basin were preliminarily investigated through macroscopic provenance analysis. The data implies only in small changes of the source areas through the history of the basin, with source areas in the Serra das Encantadas High, which was then uplifted. In the upper conglomeratic deposits there is some contribution of lithoclasts from the Caçapava do Sul High. The sedimentary deposits of the top of the Guaritas Group were studied through macroscopic provenance analysis in alluvial fan and fluvial deposits, the latter covering the alluvial fans in erosive contact. The data points to strictly local provenance, from the Serra das Encantadas High in the alluvial fan deposits, while the fluvial deposits had also more distant source areas. This suggests that the Serra das Encantadas High subsided during this period, and was covered by the younger fluvial deposits. The collected data suggests that the Caçapava do Sul High uplift, which took place during the deposition of the Santa Bárbara Group and individualized the western sub-basin, triggered a progradation of the sedimentary deposits. This is not in accordance with the existing models, and could be explained as a result of both of an increase in the sedimentary input by erosion of unlithified sediments deposited on the Caçapava do Sul High and of the fall in the subsidence rates of the sedimentary basins due to a wide doming before the nucleation of the main border fault. Such progradation is registered in the alluvial successions of the Santa Bárbara Group in the western and central sub-basins. After the definition of the normal faulting in the eastern border of the structural high, an abrupt passage to distal facies took place in the occidental sub-basin, which was in turn was followed by progradation of clastic wedges on the top of the unit, while in the central sub-basin there is a retrogradation, suggesting that the uplift of the Caçapava do Sul High would have resulted in the capture of a main drainage system, that fed the entire basin, to the western basin graben, and so decreasing the sedimentary input to the central sub-basin. The Guaritas Group in its turn indicates a change in the depositional systems caused by the subsidence of the Serra das Encantadas High, which allowed the capture of drainage systems to the basin, thus increasing the sedimentary input and the substitution of the eolian and alluvial fan systems by braided fluvial systems. (AU)