0000000000164404
AUTHOR
J. Javier ÁLvaro
The Early-Cambrian Boho volcano of the El Graara massif, Morocco: Petrology, geodynamic setting and coeval sedimentation
15 pages; International audience; A major volcanic episode is recorded across the Neoproterozoic-Cambrian transition in the Moroccan Anti-Atlas. Several volcanic cones are still preserved in the El Graara massif, laterally correlatable with volcanic flows dated as Early Cambrian (U/Pb date of 534 ± 10 Ma). Volcanic ashes and flows are interbedded with the uppermost part of the Adoudou dolostones, whereas the best-preserved volcano (the Boho Jbel) is onlapped by the overlying Lie-de-vin strata. Available petro-geochemical data from the Boho volcano suggest an alkaline magmatism probably derived from low-grade melting of a garnet–lherzolite mantle source, followed by fractional crystallizatio…
Fabric transitions from shell accumulations to reefs: an introduction with Palaeozoic examples
One unresolved conceptual problem in some Palaeozoic sedimentary strata is the boundary between the concepts of ‘shell concentration’ and ‘reef’. In fact, numerous bioclastic strata are transitional coquina–reef deposits, because either distinct frame-building skeletons are not commonly preserved in growth position, or skeletal remains are episodically encrusted by ‘stabilizer’ (reef-like) organisms, such as calcareous and problematic algae, encrusting microbes, bryozoans, foraminifers and sponges. The term ‘parabiostrome’, coined by Kershaw, can be used to describe some stratiform bioclastic deposits formed through the growth and destruction, by fair-weather wave and storm wave action, of …
Pre-Hirnantian (latest Ordovician) benthic community assemblages: controls and replacements in a siliciclastic-dominated platform of the eastern Anti-Atlas, Morocco.
17 pages; International audience; Lower-middle Ashgill sedimentary strata from the Mediterranean region have recorded a key episode of temperate-to-cold water, carbonate productivity predating the onset of the Hirnantian glaciation. The latitudinal position of the Moroccan margin of North Gondwana during Ashgill should have been adequate for the recorded development of carbonate factories. However, carbonate productivity was neither homogeneous nor laterally persistent, as documented in the eastern Anti-Atlas. Whereas in the Erfoud area, the bryozoan-dominated limestones of the Ashgill Khabt-el-Hajar Formation indicate the intensive activity of carbonate factories, these were dramatically r…