Tectonic, volcanic, and paleogeographic implications of redeposited reef faunas of Late Cretaceous and Tertiary age from the Nauru Basin and the Line Islands.

Abstract

The probable sequence of volcanic events at Site 462 appears to be 1) formation of the underlying Pacific Plate 148Ma ago, 2) extrusive volcanism in Barremian time, about 115Ma ago, 3) sill and flow volcanism accompanied by edifice-building in late Aptian time, about 110Ma ago, and 4) a further episode of edifice-building and deep-water volcanism beginning in the Campanian and ceasing by the middle Maestrichtian, about 70Ma ago. Application of models relating lithospheric uplift and subsidence to volcanism developed by Crough (1978) and Detrick and Crough (1978), combined with sedimentological and paleontological evidence from Site 462, allows a semi-quantitative reconstruction of the vertical tectonic history of the Nauru Basin. -from Authors