A seção-tipo da Formação Serra do Quilombo, Grupo Araras, Neoproterozoico da Faixa Paraguai Norte, Mato Grosso

Abstract

After the last Cryogenian glaciation (ca. 635 Ma), large carbonate platforms were developed in several cratonic regions of the Earth and, despite the intense dolomitization of these deposits, paleoceanographic and paleoenvironmental pieces of information are preserved. One of the most important examples of this period in Brazil are the dolostones of Serra do Quilombo Formation, which belong to the upper portion of the Araras Group, exposed in the northern Paraguay Belt, south of the Amazonian Craton. The stratigraphic revaluation of this formation in its type-section and in a reference section in the Nobres region, based on facies and stratigraphic analyses, allowed to enlarge the paleoenvironmental interpretations and to propose a depositional model. The study succession of 140 m thick includes Serra do Quilombo Formation in sharp basal contact with the limestones of Guia Formation and the gradual contact, to the top, with the sandy dolostones of Nobres Formation, at the top. Serra do Quilombo Formation comprises a shallowing upward succession, which includes two facies associations: 1) deep to moderately shallow carbonate platform, composed of laminated dolostone rich in organic matter and a massive to laminated dolostone; and 2) storm influenced shoreface, consisting of hummocky/swaley to planar stratified sandy dolostone, sandy/oolitic dolostone with wave cross laminations and matrix-supported dolomitic breccias. Serra do Quilombo Formation represents the progradational record of a high-stand system tract, in a homoclinal carbonate ramp, installed on the southern part of the Amazonian Craton during the Ediacaran.