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Silurian-Devonian Land–Sea Interaction within the San Rafael Block, Argentina: Provenance of the Río Seco de los Castaños Formation

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Pre-carboniferous Evolution of the San Rafael Block, Argentina

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Abstract

The Río Seco de los Castaños Formation (RSC) is one of the ‘pre-Carboniferous units’ outcrop** within the San Rafael Block assigned to Upper Silurian–Lower Devonian age. We review the provenance data obtained by petrography and geochemical-isotope analyses as well as the U–Pb detrital zircon ages. Comparison with La Horqueta Formation is also discussed. The main components of this marine fine-grained siliciclastic platform are sandstones and mudstones. The conglomerates are restricted to channel fill deposits developed mainly at the Lomitas Negras location. A low anchizone for the RSC was indicated by illite crystallinity index. From the geochemical proxies described above (Manassero et al. in Devonian Change: Case studies in Palaeogeography and Palaeoecology. Geological Society, 2009) a provenance from an unrecycled crust with an average composition similar to depleted compared with average Upper Continental Crust is suggested. T DM ages are within the range of the Mesoproterozoic basement and Palaeozoic supracrustal rocks of the Precordillera-Cuyania terrane. ε Nd values of the RSC are similar to those from sedimentary rocks from the Lower Palaeozoic carbonate-siliciclastic platform of the San Rafael Block. These data suggest an Early Carboniferous (Mississipian) low-metamorphic (anchizone) event for the unit. It is correlated with the ‘Chanic’ tectonic phase that affected the Precordillera-Cuyania terrane and also linked to the collision of the Chilenia terrane in the western pre-Andean Gondwana margin. As final remarks we can comment that the studied RSC samples show dominant source derivation from Famatinian (Late Cambrian-Devonian) and Pampean-Brasiliano (Neoproterozoic-Early Cambrian) cycles. Detritus derived from the Mesoproterozoic basement are scarce. U–Pb data constrain the maximum sedimentation age of the RSC to the Silurian–Early Devonian.

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Acknowledgements

Field and laboratory work were financially supported by CONICET (grants PIPs 0647, 199), ANPCyT (grant PICT 07027) and University of La Plata (Projects 11/573, 11/704). We thank to colleagues Daniel Poiré, Eduardo Morel, Peter Königshof, Pablo Pazos, and Eduardo Llambías for field work assistance and suggestions. Thanks to Prof. Koji Kawashita for hel** us in U–Pb laboratory work and data interpretation. Finally we acknowledge to Genaro Arena and his family as field guide experts for Lomitas Negras and Agua del Blanco regions.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Universidad Nacional de La Plata and Centro de Investigaciones Geológicas, Diag. 113 n. 275, CP1904, La Plata, Argentina

    Carlos A. Cingolani & Marcelo J. Manassero

  2. División Geología, Museo de La Plata, UNLP, Paseo del Bosque s/n, B1900FWA, La Plata, Argentina

    Carlos A. Cingolani & Norberto Javier Uriz

  3. Centro Universitario Regional Este, Universidad de la República, Ruta 8 Km 282, Treinta y Tres, Uruguay

    Paulina Abre

  4. Centro de Pesquisas Geocronologicas (CPGeo), Instituto de Geociencias, Universidade de São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil

    Miguel A. S. Basei

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  1. Carlos A. Cingolani
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  4. Marcelo J. Manassero
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Correspondence to Carlos A. Cingolani .

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  1. Centro de Investigaciones Geológicas (UNLP-CONICET), National University of La Plata, La Plata, Argentina

    Carlos Alberto Cingolani

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Cingolani, C.A., Uriz, N.J., Abre, P., Manassero, M.J., Basei, M.A.S. (2017). Silurian-Devonian Land–Sea Interaction within the San Rafael Block, Argentina: Provenance of the Río Seco de los Castaños Formation. In: Cingolani, C. (eds) Pre-carboniferous Evolution of the San Rafael Block, Argentina. Springer Earth System Sciences. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-50153-6_10

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