Refining accretionary orogen models for the Tasmanides of eastern Australia

The well-known southwest-to-northeast younging of stratigraphy over a present-day cross strike distance of >1500 km in the southern Tasmanides of eastern Australia has been used to argue for models of accretionary orogenesis behind a continually eastwards-rolling paleo-Pacific plate. However, these accretionary models need modification, since the oldest (ca 530 Ma) outcrops of Cambrian supra-subduction zone rocks occur in the outboard New England Orogen, now ～900 km east of the next oldest (520–510 Ma) supra-subduction zone rocks. This is not consistent with simple, continuous easterly rollback. Instead, the southern Tasmanides contain an early history characterised by a westwards-migrating margin between ca 530 and ca 520 Ma, followed by rapid eastwards rollback of the paleo-Pacific plate from 520 to 502 Ma that opened a vast backarc basin ～2000 km across that has never been closed. From the Ordovician through to the end of the Carboniferous, the almost vertical stacking of continental margin arcs (within a hundred kilometres of each other) in the New England Orogen indicates a constant west-dipping plate boundary in a Gondwana reference frame. Although the actual position of the boundary is inferred to have undergone contraction-related advances and extension-related retreats, these movements are estimated to be ～250 km or less. Rollback in the early Permian was never completely reversed, so that late Permian–Triassic to Cretaceous arcs lie farther east, in the very eastern part of eastern Australia, with rifted fragments occurring in the Lord Howe Rise and in New Zealand. The northern Tasmanides are even more anomalous, since they missed out on the middle Cambrian plate boundary retreat seen in the south. As a result, their Cambrian-to-Devonian history is concentrated in a ～300 km wide strip immediately west of Precambrian cratonic Australia and above Precambrian basement. The presence in this narrow region of Ordovician to Carboniferous continental margin arcs and backarc basins also implies a virtually stationary plate boundary in a Gondwana frame of reference. This bipolar character of the Tasmanides suggests the presence of a segmented paleo-Pacific Plate, with major transform faults propagating into the Tasmanides as tear faults that were favourably oriented for the formation of local supra-subduction zone systems and for subsequent intraplate north–south shortening. In this interpretation of the Tasmanides, Lower–Middle Ordovician quartz-rich turbidites accumulated as submarine fan sequences, and do not represent multiple subduction complexes developed above subduction zones lying behind the plate boundary. Indeed, the Tasmanides are characterised by the general absence of material accreted from the paleo-Pacific plate and by the dominance of craton-derived, recycled sedimentary rocks.     

Gas generation and expulsion characteristics of Middle–Upper Triassic source rocks,eastern Kuqa Depression,Tarim Basin,China: implications for shale gas resource potential

Frontier exploration in the Kuqa Depression, western China, has identified the continuous tight-sand gas accumulation in the Lower Cretaceous and Lower Jurassic as a major unconventional gas pool. However, assessment of the shale gas resource in the Kuqa Depression is new. The shale succession in the Middle–Upper Triassic comprises the Taliqike Formation (T₃t), the Huangshanjie Formation (T₃h) and the middle–upper Karamay Formation (T_2–3k), with an average accumulated thickness of 260 m. The high-quality shale is dominated by type III kerogen with high maturity and an average original total organic carbon (TOC) of about 2.68 wt%. An improved hydrocarbon generation and expulsion model was applied to this self-contained source–reservoir system to reveal the gas generation and expulsion (intensity, efficiency and volume) characteristics of Middle–Upper Triassic source rocks. The maximum volume of shale gas in the source rocks was obtained by determining the difference between generation and expulsion volumes. The results indicate that source rocks reached the hydrocarbon expulsion threshold of 1.1% VR and the hydrocarbon generation and expulsion reached their peak at 1.0% VR and 1.28% VR, with the maximum rate of 56 mg HC/0.1% TOC and 62.8 mg HC/0.1% TOC, respectively. The volumes of gas generation and expulsion from Middle–Upper Triassic source rocks were 12.02 × 10¹² m³ and 5.98 × 10¹² m³, respectively, with the residual volume of 6.04 × 10¹² m³, giving an average gas expulsion efficiency of 44.38% and retention efficiency of 55.62%. Based on the gas generation and expulsion characteristics, the predicted shale gas potential volume is 6.04 × 10¹² m³, indicating a significant shale gas resource in the Middle–Upper Triassic in the eastern Kuqa Depression.     

Daily rainfall projections from general circulation models with a downscaling nonhomogeneous hidden Markov model (NHMM) for south‐eastern Australia

An ensemble of stochastic daily rainfall projections has been generated for 30 stations across south‐eastern Australia using the downscaling nonhomogeneous hidden Markov model, which was driven by atmospheric predictors from four climate models for three IPCC emissions scenarios (A1B, A2, and B1) and for two periods (2046–2065 and 2081–2100). The results indicate that the annual rainfall is projected to decrease for both periods for all scenarios and climate models, with the exception of a few scenarios of no statistically significant changes. However, there is a seasonal difference: two downscaled GCMs consistently project a decline of summer rainfall, and two an increase. In contrast, all four downscaled GCMs show a decrease of winter rainfall. Because winter rainfall accounts for two‐thirds of the annual rainfall and produces the majority of streamflow for this region, this decrease in winter rainfall would cause additional water availability concerns in the southern Murray–Darling basin, given that water shortage is already a critical problem in the region. In addition, the annual maximum daily rainfall is projected to intensify in the future, particularly by the end of the 21st century; the maximum length of consecutive dry days is projected to increase, and correspondingly, the maximum length of consecutive wet days is projected to decrease. These changes in daily sequencing, combined with fewer events of reduced amount, could lead to drier catchment soil profiles and further reduce runoff potential and, hence, also have streamflow and water availability implications. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Southern margin of the Variscan belt: the north-western Gondwana mobile zone (eastern Morocco and Northern Algeria)

Stratigraphic and structural correlations between the Palaeozoic massifs of eastern Morocco and northern Algeria allow three tectonic domains to be distinguished: (1) The cratonic zone, i.e. the West African platform which remained outside the Variscan chain and its peripherical margin (Moroccan Anti-Atlas and Algerian Ougarta); (2) a WSW-ENE trending zone, over 1500 km from Marrakech to Kabylia and Calabria (in their assumed Palaeozoic location). — This zone was characterized during the Late Palaeozoic by a continuous instability indicated by the development of successive turbiditic basins and a major orogeny at the Devonian-Carboniferous boundary; and (3) central and western Morocco, which corresponds to the external zones of the European Hercynides.The Marrakech-Kabylia zone separates the Variscan domain from the stable and undeformed West African craton. During Early Palaeozoic times it began as an extensive or transtensive zone. It has been deformed by the Late Devonian orogeny and by Carboniferous and Permian reactivation. The zone represents the southern limit of the Hercynian chain and is distinguished by its transcurrent regime throughout the Late Palaeozoic. Correspondence to: A. Piqué     

中国东部地洼阶段应力场与锡成矿

中国东部地壳地洼阶段的热塑性变形应力场有利于锡成矿。构造应力场对锡成矿的控制作用,表现为对成矿域的矿液运移势和能量场的控制。推导获得矿液运移势的计算公式:Vi=-(a·K_0/u)·[exp(σ_1-σ_2)]·(σ_1+σ_2),表明地壳构造应力场对成矿域矿液的运移和成矿部位的选择提供了有利的动力学条件。     

Late Ordovician evolution of the intracratonic basins in north-west Gondwana

The Palaeozoic intracratonic basins in northwest Gondwana, i.e. the Amazonas, Parnaiba and Acera basins, probably opened during late Caradoc and Ashgill times. The fluviatile sedimentation later changed to littoral at the basinal margins. A transgression from the north-west region of Gondwana slowly overlapped the margins of the intracratonic basins. The transgression reached its maximum in the Rawtheyan (late Ashgill), as evidenced by fossiliferous shallow marine sediments in the Amazonas Basin. The Hirnantian glaciation in north Gondwana lowered the sea level, and in the Amazonas Basin a littoral sedimentation followed on shallow marine strata. From the opening of the basins onwards, a shallow sea probably existed close to the epicontinental basins in north-west Gondwana. The basins were connected via a narrow passage between the Guayana and Ivorian cratons.     

西藏羌塘南部地区的冰海杂砾岩及其成因

青藏高原及邻区广泛分布的漂砾层、杂砾岩、含砾板岩是一种特殊的冰海相沉积岩，称为冰海杂砾岩（Ｉｃｅ－ｓｅａＭｉｘ－ｃｏｎｇｌｏｍｅｒａｔｅｓ）。它们和一起产出的冷水型动物群、耐冷植物群视为这一地区冈瓦纳相最典型的标志，代表着冈瓦纳大陆上塔尔切尔（Ｔａｌｃｈｉｒ）冰期所影响的时间和空间。除“标准型”冰海杂砾岩外，羌塘腹地发现了蛇绿质和钙质冰海杂砾岩。这两种冰海杂砾岩的发现，不但丰富了冰海杂砾岩的家族成员，同时也为冰海沉积、物质来源问题、冈瓦纳大陆北界及特提斯演化研究提供了新的信息。经研究，冰海杂砾岩中的砾石来自印度半岛──冈瓦纳大陆本体，以冰筏为载体融冰落石成因。     

中国东部新生代玄武岩中单斜辉石巨晶的主要特征及成因信息

作者通过对我国东部新生代玄武岩中巨晶Cpx的109个样品的化学成分的统计、计算及投影,研究了Cpx巨晶的产状、物性及矿物化学的主要特征,并对其成因信息提出了自己的看法。Cpx巨晶的成分以A1_2O_3、A1~(v1)较高而Ti、Mg'中等为特征。但在“反应边”中,A1_2O_3、Na_2O、A1、A1~(v1)则明显降低。我国巨晶以普通辉石为主,而透辉石、次透辉石及顽透辉石少见。国内不同地区的Cpx巨晶成分也略有不同:华南区巨晶的Wo较高而A1_2O_3较低;华北区Fs、A1_2O_3较高;而东北区En较高而A1_2O_3中等。有关Cpx巨晶的成因信息,作者的观点是:(1)巨晶Cpx是寄主玄武岩浆在上地幔中结晶的产物,而不是地幔解体的捕虏晶。(2)我国巨晶Cpx的结晶温度是1021—1209℃,压力为1.4—3.2GPa,所以,Cpx巨晶的结晶深度为48—104Km。(3)我国东部新生代玄武岩均产于大陆板块内部,以碱性玄武岩成分为主,而拉斑玄武岩较少。     

滇东-黔西地区晚二叠世煤岩及煤层气储层物性分析

本文以丰富的地质资料对滇东－黔西地区晚二叠世煤岩分布的割理（裂隙）,吸附、孔隙溶积、镜质组含量、含气性、灰分产率等进行了较为系统的研究,初步建立了煤炭与煤层气储层物性的关系,提出了镜质组含量的煤炭类型有较好的煤层气储集物性条件。     

Researches on Plants from the Lower Devonian Xujiachong Formation in the Qujing District, Eastern Yunnan

Fossil plants Hedeia sinica Hao et Gensel 1998, Huia gracilis Wang et Hao 2001 and Guangnania cuneata Wang et Hao are described from the Lower Devonian Xujiachong Formation, the Qujing district, eastern Yunnan, China. They contribute to our knowledge of the flora in this district. Based on the occurrence of common plants (Hedeia, Huia, Guangnania and Zosterophyllum australianum) and their horizons, it is proved for the first time that the mid-lower assemblage of the Xujiachong flora is comparable with the Early Devonian ((late) Pragian) Posongchong flora of southeastern Yunnan and the upper Baragwanathia flora of Australia. In view of this fact and the stratigraphic sequence, the mid-lower part of the Xujiachong Formation is considered to be of (late) Pragian age. Through comprehensive analyses of plant, bivalve and fish assemblages and the lithology, the upper part of the Xujiachong Formation is dated to be of early Emsian age. The Xujiachong flora belonged to the northeastern Gondwana palaeophytogeogr