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Major Geologic Events of the Cauvery Basin, India and Their Correlation with Global Signatures- a Review

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Major Geologic Events of the Cauvery Basin, India and Their Correlation with Global Signatures- a Review Accepted Manuscript Major geologic events of the Cauvery Basin, India and their correlation with global signatures- A review R. Nagendra, A. Nallapa Reddy PII: S2095-3836(16)30071-2 DOI: 10.1016/j.jop.2016.09.002 Reference: JOP 38 To appear in: Journal of Palaeogeography Received Date: 1 August 2016 Accepted Date: 12 September 2016 Please cite this article as: Nagendra, R., Reddy, A.N., Major geologic events of the Cauvery Basin, India and their correlation with global signatures- A review, Journal of Palaeogeography (2016), doi: 10.1016/ j.jop.2016.09.002. This is a PDF file of an unedited manuscript that has been accepted for publication. As a service to our customers we are providing this early version of the manuscript. The manuscript will undergo copyediting, typesetting, and review of the resulting proof before it is published in its final form. Please note that during the production process errors may be discovered which could affect the content, and all legal disclaimers that apply to the journal pertain. ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT 1 Journal of Palaeogeography, 2017, 6(1): Lithofacies palaeogeography and sedimentology Major geologic events of the Cauvery Basin, India and their correlation with global signatures- A review1 Received August 1, 2016; accepted September 12, 2016 Available online R. Nagendra, A. Nallapa Reddy* Department of Geology, Anna University, Chennai-600025, India Abstract The present review is aimed at correlating major geologic events of the Cauvery Basin with analogous global episodes. The Cauvery Basin came into existence due to Gondwana break up during late Jurassic-early Cretaceous by taphrogenic rift process. The first marine transgression close to Aptian/Albian boundary at the western margin of the basin terminates the syn-rift tectonic phase, which is also precise in adjoining Krishna-Godavari (KG) Basin. Two regional tectonic episodes are well documented in the basin which has global significance viz. (1) a major basinal uplift during late Turonian caused by Marion hot mantle plume resulted in widespread subaqueous volcanism in the southern part of the Cauvery Basin. This uplift also led to relative sea level fall (RSL) of about 100 m in Cauvery and KG Basins and an unconformity of a magnitude of 2.3Ma. The RSL fall closely correlates with global sea level fall. This volcanic episode also resulted in Madagascar detachment from India. (2) The reunion hot mantle plume that led to Deccan volcanism in central India resulted in E-SE tilt of the Cauvery Basin during upper Maastrichtian (CF1-CF3 zones). This tilt caused a sea level fall of about 80 m and lateral withdrawal of sea by about 50 km developing a major erosional unconformityMANUSCRIPT ranging in magnitude of ~1.8-30My. The magnitude of RSL correlates well with global sea level fall. This sea level fall caused widespread development of canyon features in the Cauvery Basin resulting in differential subaqueous erosion. The globally significant ocean anoxic events viz. OAE-1b, OAE-1d, OAE-2 and OAE-3 are fairly discernible in the Cauvery Basin. The new isotopic palaeotemperature data suggests that southern India and Madagascar were located apparently in middle latitudes within the tropical-subtropical climatic zone during Albian and Early Maastrichtian. The magnitude of hiatus across k-pg boundary varying from 0-30Ma is estimated based on planktic foraminifera for subsurface sections. The magnetostratigraphy of outcrop sediments with rich fossil evidences reveal that magnetic polarity reversals consist of 13 magnetozones in the late Cretaceous sedimentary strata. 1 Corresponding author. E-mail address: [email protected]. Peer review under responsibility of China University of Petroleum (Beijing). http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jop.2016. 2095-3836/© 2016 China University of Petroleum (Beijing). Production and hosting by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT 2 Keywords Cauvery Basin, Correlation, Geologic events, Global episodes 1. Introduction Cauvery Basin is a Peri cratonic basin extending over 50,000 km2 both in on land and offshore up to 2000 m bathymetry. More than 6000 m pile of sediments belonging to Permian to recent age is well preserved in the basin. These sediments are drilled through in the basin in pursuit of establishing hydrocarbon resources (Raju and Reddy, 2016; Reddy et al., 2013). The basin has well preserved Aptian- Palaeocene sediments exposed in its western margin in Ariyalur district (Fig.1) of TamilNadu state straddled by major and minor unconformities. The architecture of these sediment strata in their entirety can be well observed in mine and quarry sections excavated for mining of clays and limestone (Nagendra et al., 2011). The basin has similarity in its tectonic evolution, stratigraphy, and sea level trends with central European basins viz. Danish, North Sea, North German and Northern Gulf of Mexico basins (Nagendra et al., 2011). The present study attempts to correlate major geologic events that occurred in the Cauvery Basin with those of global nature. MANUSCRIPT ACCEPTED ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT 3 MANUSCRIPT ACCEPTED Fig.1 Lithological formation map of outcrop Cretaceous sediments of Ariyalur, Cauvery Basin. ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT 4 2. Rifting process and basin evolution The initiation of the Cauvery Basin along the eastern passive margin of India and consequent sedimentation is attributed to the fragmentation of eastern Gondwana and opening up of the Indian Ocean which began in late Jurassic (~160Ma ago) (Rangaraju,1993) The early sheared rift extensional faulting initiated during Upper Jurassic/Lower Cretaceous (Scotese, 1997; Shyam Chand and Subrahmanyam, 2001), and was followed by a progressive rift that seems to have continued until the end of the Turonian (Watkinson et al., 2007). The end of the syn-rift phase in Lower Cretaceous (Late Aptian 112 Ma) is inferred primarily on the basis of chronology of various events: the breakup unconformity and first marine transgression at the western basin margin (Reddy et al., 2013). The Cauvery Basin configured morphologically into six half-graben blocks trending in NE-SW separated by horsts. The exposed Cretaceous system of the Cauvery Basin consists of a complete marine sequence rich in faunal assemblages ranging from Albian to Maastrichtian. The non-marine syn-rift sediments are represented by three isolated outcrops (Teranipalyam, Kalpadi, Neykulam and Terani plant beds) along the western margin of the Ariyalur area. The Archaean basement is characterized by structural highs and lows, evidenced by strong tectonic activity affecting the basin since its inception. Four major tectonic andMANUSCRIPT sedimentary phases are recorded. (1) The first is taphrogenic rifting and associated block movement along the dominant NE-SW trend during Upper Jurassic-Lower Cretaceous, resulting in morphotectonic humps and deep slopes. (2) Post-rift thermal subsidence during Albian to Maastrichtian led to deepening of the basin accommodating thick marine carbonates and clastics. A major uplift caused by Marion hot mantle plume ca.88-90Ma, resulted in widespread volcanism in the southern part of the Cauvery Basin. Detachment of Madagascar from India is also linked to this volcanic episode (Gerta Keller, 2016). Post uplift event, subsidence rate rapidly increased and basin experienced deep marine conditions 3) The east, southeast tilt of the basin during late Maastrichtian-Palaeocene and resultant relative sea level fall due to Deccan volcanism (67.4- 65.3Ma) caused by reunion hot mantle plume, and as a result sediment depocentres migrated basin wards, fillingACCEPTED the canyon features developed consequent to the relative sea level fall. 4) The last phase spanning Eocene to Miocene signifies coastal progradations/deltaic sedimentation through a series of marine transgression and regressions in response to the oscillatory tectonic movements. ACCEPTED MANUSCRIPT 5 Watkinson et al., (2007) revealed that continental lacustrine and alluvial sediments were deposited during rift related extension in the Cauvery Basin. The continued extension facilitated inundation of marine waters into the most landward parts of the Cauvery Basin. They considered the terminal point of rift related extension in the mid-Turonian marks the end of syn-rift stage and the main subsidence mechanism after this was dominantly thermal re-equilibration of the lithosphere. However, we feel that the Turonian uplift of the basin cannot be related to rift tectonics, the entire basin was under deep marine conditions at the time of rise of Marion hot mantle plume (Courtillot et al., 1988; Raju et al., 1994; Reddy et al., 2013). Lambiase (1990) considered two approaches to marking the terminal syn-rift in passive margin basins viz. (1) end of major rift tectonics (2) end of continental/fluvial sediment deposition. Therefore we prefer to adapt the second approach to marking syn-rift top in the Cauvery Basin. The facies transition between fluvial and marine deposition can be observed in the uppermost Terani Formation exposed in Neykulam quarry. The marine sediments yielded planktic foraminifera: Hedbergella trocoidea, H. planispira, H. delrioensis and broken ammonite fossils, suggesting Late Aptian to Early Albian, indicating that the top of syn-rift fill is close to Aptian/Albian boundary (Reddy et al., 2013). In the Cauvery Basin, the syn-rift fill can be subdivided based on lithologicalMANUSCRIPT content into syn-rift
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