UC Riverside UC Riverside Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Title Old Fort Point Formation: Neoproterozoic Negative d13C Excursion Recorded in a Deep- Water Carbonate Succession

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Author Lanni, Jordan Nicole

Publication Date 2017

Peer reviewed|Thesis/dissertation

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UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA RIVERSIDE

Old Fort Point Formation: Neoproterozoic Negative d13C Excursion Recorded in a Deep-Water Carbonate Succession

A Thesis submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of

Master of Science

Geological Sciences

Jordan Nicole Lanni

September 2017

Thesis Committee: Dr. Andrey Bekker, Chairperson Dr. Peter Sadler Dr. Timothy Lyons

The Thesis of Jordan Nicole Lanni is approved:

Committee Chairperson

University of California, Riverside Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Dr. Bekker for the idea of this project, which has proved to be exceedingly fascinating to me, and for his patience and advice through this entire process. I would also like to thank Dr. Sadler for his countless hours of advice throughout my undergraduate and graduate career and inspiring teaching techniques. Thank you to all those in the department who have helped in other ways: Laurie Graham for assisting with stable isotope analyses and petrographic preparation; Steve Bates for assisting with stable isotope corrections, and both Steve and Andy Robinson for their assistance in the analyses for minor and trace element concentrations.

Additionally, I would like to thank all of my TA professors and students I have had over the last three years. Every one of you enriched my graduate experience and it was a joy to work with you. Fellow hallway mates Jozi Pearson and Jerlyn Swiatlowski were faithful friends and sources of advice through the entire process. Drs. Gordon Love and Mary Droser also were exceedingly helpful through difficult times.

As for Canada, I would like to thank Dr. Murray Gingras who showed us around the Old Fort Point

Formation in Jasper. Early in the trip, the author sustained a serious ankle injury which severely limited mobility. The author’s injury combined with inclement weather prevented measuring sections. Dr. Gingras, Dr. Bekker and my field assistant Ted Mironchuk were also very helpful during the initial phase of my injury. I would like to extend special thanks to Ted for being the wise and practical one: preventing me from injuring myself further, carrying an exceptionally large and decorative chunk of OFPF limestone on his back, and being an all-around good field assistant. I would like to thank Nathan Wagenet, his family, and my family for their support through this entire process. I thank God for the strength he granted to me during these three years.

ABSTRACT OF THE THESIS

Old Fort Point Formation: Neoproterozoic Negative d13C Excursion Recorded in a Deep-Water Carbonate Succession

Jordan Nicole Lanni

Master of Science, Graduate Program in Geological Sciences University of California, Riverside, September 2017 Dr. Andrey Bekker, Chairperson

The Precambrian recorded dramatic atmospheric and geochemical

fluctuations, such as the “Snowball Earth,” the most severe glaciation in geologic

history, and the Earth’s most significant negative carbon isotope excursion, the

Shuram Excursion, which has been identified in multiple, globally-disparate locations.

The excursion recorded a rapid negative δ13C shift to approximately -12‰ and

recovery over hundreds of meters in some units, which are predominantly shallow-

marine carbonates. The excursion’s poor age constraints currently imply a maximum

duration of some forty million years,