Stratigraphy, Sedimentology and Palynology of the Neogene-Pleistocene(?) Rocks Around Akçaşehir- Tire-İzmir (Küçük Menderes Graben, Western Anatolia)

Abstract

The basement rocks located in the central part of the southern edge of the Küçük Menderes Graben, around Akçaşehir-Tire are composed of marbles, schists, gneisses and metagabbros of the Ödemiş-Kiraz submassif of the Menderes Massif, and schists, marbles and meta-olistostromes of the Cycladic Complex. The basement is unconformably overlain by Neogene-Quaternary continental sediments. These continental basin fills are comprised of the Ayakli{dotless}ki{dotless}ri{dotless} Formation, the Aydoǧdu Formation and alluvium that unconformably overlies them. The Lower-Upper Miocene Ayakli{dotless}ki{dotless}ri{dotless} Formation consists of lacustrine and fluvial deposits. The Plio-Pleistocene (?) Aydoǧdu Formation is made up of alluvial fan deposits. Vast plains of alluvium cover the youngest formations. The lowest part of the Ayakli{dotless}ki{dotless}ri{dotless} Formation is represented by terrestrial to very shallow lake environments, represented by silts, clays, laminated micritic carbonates, ostracod-bearing laminated algal, microbial and peloidal microbial carbonates, algal carbonate crusts and pebbly, sandy, clayey, micritic carbonates. Palynological data collected from coal beds around Akçaşehir-Tire shows that the Ayakli{dotless}ki{dotless}ri{dotless} Formation was deposited during the latest Early Miocene-earliest Late Miocene. Palynological data and some gastropoda taxa such as Planorbis sp. and Limnea sp. indicate that the Ayakli{dotless}ki{dotless}ri{dotless} Formation was deposited in a lacustrine environment. Palaeoclimatic results indicate a warm temperate to humid climate preceding the Middle Miocene Climatic Optimum. ©TÜBİTAK.