Search results for "Planetary Science"
showing 10 items of 4367 documents
Continental-scale temperature variability during the past two millennia
2013
Past global climate changes had strong regional expression. To elucidate their spatio-temporal pattern, we reconstructed past temperatures for seven continental-scale regions during the past one to two millennia. The most coherent feature in nearly all of the regional temperature reconstructions is a long-term cooling trend, which ended late in the nineteenth century. At multi-decadal to centennial scales, temperature variability shows distinctly different regional patterns, with more similarity within each hemisphere than between them. There were no globally synchronous multi-decadal warm or cold intervals that define a worldwide Medieval Warm Period or Little Ice Age, but all reconstructi…
Les ammonites du Pliensbachien du jebel Bou Rharraf (Haut Atlas oriental, Maroc).
2011
60 pages; International audience; L'originalité des dépôts sédimentaires et des faunes d'ammonites du jebel Bou Rharraf repose sur la présence de faciès « Ammonitico Rosso », les plus occidentaux connus pour le Pliensbachien, une forte diversité des Phylloceratida (Phylloceras, Calaiceras, Zetoceras, Partschiceras et Juraphyllites) et une disparité morphologique importante chez les Galaticeras, Miltoceras et les Tauromeniceras. Si quelques formes, telles que Miltoceras taguendoufi et Mauretaniaceras elmii nov. gen., nov. sp. ont un cachet endémique très affirmé, les faunes du Pliensbachien du Haut Atlas oriental sont classiques pour la marge sud de la Téthys occidentale. Trois genres (Callo…
First report of Gogia (Eocrinoidea, Echinodermata) from the Early-Middle Cambrian of Sonora (Mexico), with biostratigraphical and palaeoecological co…
2009
10 pages; International audience; The blastozoan echinoderm genus Gogia is reported for the first time in the Early and the Middle Cambrian of Mexico. Reports in different members of the section of San José de Gracia (Sonora State, northwestern Mexico) extend the palaeogeographical range of the genus to the South Laurentia, and the stratigraphic range of Gogia granulosa to the whole first half of middle Middle Cambrian. Isolated plates occur in rocks deposited in detrital inner platform and complete specimens, in carbonate outer platform, confirming their ability to live in diverse environments. Their presence in these different environments through the Early-Middle Cambrian on Laurentia ag…
The Uniqueness of Planktonic Ecosystems in the Mediterranean Sea: The Response to Orbital- and Suborbital-Climatic Forcing over the Last 130,000 Years
2016
AbstractThe Mediterranean Sea is an ideal location to test the response of organisms to hydrological transformations driven by climate change. Here we review studies carried out on planktonic foraminifera and coccolithophores during the late Quaternary and attempt the comparison of data scattered in time and space. We highlight the prompt response of surface water ecosystems to both orbital- and suborbital-climatic variations.A markedly different spatial response was observed in calcareous plankton assemblages, possibly due to the influence of the North Atlantic climatic system in the western, central and northern areas and of the monsoon system in the easternmost and southern sites. Orbita…
An aeolian or a glaciolacustrine record? A case study from Mieļupīte, Middle Gauja Lowland, northeast Latvia
2017
Abstract In the Middle Gauja Lowland, northeast Latvia, dunes are distributed over a vast glaciolacustrine plain that formed during the retreat of the Fennoscandian ice sheet. Such a direct contact between aeolian and glaciolacustrine sediments can be used to infer depositional settings and decipher to what extent these sediments bear an aeolian component. Our proxies, although preliminary, reveal a limited range of variation in grain-size parameters, a significant presence of quartz grains with silica precipitation and matt-surface grains of various rounding degrees and massive structure combined with horizontal lamination. These are indicative of periglacial-aeolian depositional condition…
Intact seismic-scale platforms and ramps in the Lower to Middle Jurassic of Morocco: implications for stratal anatomy and lithofacies partitioning.
2017
9 pages; International audience; The Jurassic carbonate platforms of the central High Atlas in Morocco are well known for several high-quality outcrops. In the central High Atlas, there are two complementary locations that offer critical lessons for our understanding of Jurassic carbonate system evolution in extensional basins: a Lower Jurassic high-relief, carbonate platform with steep slopes that developed on the footwall of a rotating fault block in an active half-graben (Djebel Bou Dahar [DBD]) and an upper Lower to Middle Jurassic low-angle prograding carbonate ramp rich in ooids (Amellago ramp [AR]). The DBD and AR outcrops provide superbly exposed, structurally intact, and fully acce…
Challenges in defining the base of Cambrian Series 2 and Stage 3
2017
Formal subdivision of the Cambrian System into four series and ten stages is in progress. The base of Cambrian Stage 3 (provisional), which is conterminous with the base of Cambrian Series 2 (provisional), is expected to be placed at a horizon close to the first appearance of trilobites, which marks the onset of the largest phase of the Cambrian explosion. Conceptually, an ideal boundary position would be marked by a significant and globally recognizable bioevent that divides the lower part of the Cambrian System into a sub-trilobitic Terreneuvian Series and a trilobite-dominated Series 2. If the level is to be identified principally through biostratigraphic means, its position also needs t…
Quaternary marine and continental unconformity-bounded stratigraphic units of the NW Sicily coastal belt
2017
In the coastal sector of NW Sicily, the regional correlation of relevant unconformities recognised within the Quaternary sedimentary successions allowed the mapping of seven unconformity-bounded stratigraphic units (UBSUs). The regional unconformities are marine or subaerial erosional surfaces, as well as non-depositional surfaces, locally marked by paleosoils. The erosional surfaces were produced from marine abrasion, surface water overland/concentrated flow, river erosion, karst solution, mass movement, or wind erosion. The main lithofacies of the Quaternary UBSUs consist of: (a) marine and coastal bioclastic calcarenites, (b) aeolian sandstones, (c) river deposits, (d) colluvial deposits…
A little walk between Early Jurassic sponges and corals: a confusing morphological convergence.
2019
24 pages; International audience; Hispaniastraea Turnšek et Geyer, 1975 is a unique coral genus from the Early Jurassic Epoch (Liassic). Corals of this genus are characterised by a highly dominant major septum and a set of eleven minor septa that are very short or even abortive. Initially discovered in Spain, new samples of this genus were depicted from Morocco by Beauvais in 1980; however, this genus was interpreted as a synonym of Pseudoseptifer Fischer, 1970, a chaetetid sponge (i.e., a sponge with siliceous spicules embedded in a calcareous skeleton). The skeleton of Pseudoseptifer is composed of adjacent tubules that increase by fissiparity by means of a pseudoseptum. Based on the stud…
Geology of Monte Gallo (Palermo Mts, NW Sicily)
2016
The promontory of Monte Gallo (Palermo, NW Sicily) is a spectacular site where Upper Triassic-Eocene carbonate platform rocks and Quaternary continental to marine deposits are well exposed. A Mesozoic-Paleogene rock succession allows the potential visitor to easily detect the features and the evolution of the Panormide carbonate platform, a shallow-water paleogeographic domain of the Southern Tethyan margin. Quaternary deposits, as well many landforms, enable the visitor to directly identify the interplay between climate changes, tectonics and fluctuations of marine level that occurred during the Quaternary Period. A detailed geological map (1:15,000 mapping scale) is presented, accompanied…