INVESTIGADORES
RAIGEMBORN Maria Sol
capítulos de libros
Título:
Sedimentology and paleoenvironment of the Santa Cruz Formation
Autor/es:
MATHEOS, SERGIO; RAIGEMBORN MARIA SOL
Libro:
Early Miocene Paleobiology in Patagonia: high-latitude paleocommunities of the Santa Cruz Formation?
Editorial:
Cambridge University Press
Referencias:
Lugar: Cambridge; Año: 2012; p. 59 - 82
Resumen:
Lower-middle Miocene deposits of Santa Cruz Formation are widely represented in the Atlantic coastal area of Santa Cruz province, southeast Patagonia, Argentina. This area represents an important setting from the paleontological point of view due to the intense researches that paleontologists are carrying out from the end of 1890 (Tauber, 1997, Kay et al., 2008, references therein and in chapter XX). However the sedimentological aspect of the Santa Cruz Formation was only briefly raised by Tauber (1994, 1997) who defined two members: Estancia La Costa and Estancia La Angelina, from the oldest to the youngest. Recently Matheos et al. (2008, 2010) has been analyzed some compositional aspects of the unit in the area of Parque Nacional Monte León and the coastal place between Río Coyle and Río Gallegos. The absence of detailed sedimentological studies of the Santa Cruz Formation in the coastal zone of the south of Santa Cruz province prompted us to undertake this work in an attempt to characterize, in preliminary form, the main sedimentary features of the Estancia La Costa Member, where the most important fossiliferous levels occur (sensu Tauber, 1994, 1997). We provide a compositional analysis, including the clay-mineral composition and a petrographic study, a paleoenvironmental interpretation and paleoclimatic inferences concerning with the unit. In this sense is important to remark that the deposition of the Santa Cruz Formation took place during a period where a global warming trends occur that peaked in the Mid-Miocene Climatic Optimum (15 -17 Ma) and this period was followed by the late Miocene cooling and drying trend (Zachos et al., 2001). It is probably that this condition could affect and determinate the sedimentological characteristics of the Santa Cruz Formation.
