Facies

A variety of geophysical records are examined to determine the dependence upon the lag s of a quantity called ‘rescaled range,’ denoted by R (t, s)/ S (t, s). If there had been no appreciable dependence between two values of the record at very distant points in time, the ratio R / S would have been proportional to s 0.5. But, in fact, as first noted by Edwin Hurst, the R / S ratio of hydrological and other geophysical records is proportional to s H with H ≠ 0.5. Hurst's original claims must be tightened and hedged, and his estimates of H must be discarded, but his general idea will be shown to be correct. We have shown elsewhere that this behavior of R / S means that the strength of long‐range statistical dependence in geophysical records is considerable.

@article{doi101029wr005i002p00321,
    author = "Mandelbrot, Benoît B. and Wallis, James R.",
    title = "Some long‐run properties of geophysical records",
    year = "1969",
    journal = "Water Resources Research",
    abstract = "A variety of geophysical records are examined to determine the dependence upon the lag s of a quantity called ‘rescaled range,’ denoted by R (t, s)/ S (t, s). If there had been no appreciable dependence between two values of the record at very distant points in time, the ratio R / S would have been proportional to s 0.5. But, in fact, as first noted by Edwin Hurst, the R / S ratio of hydrological and other geophysical records is proportional to s H with H ≠ 0.5. Hurst's original claims must be tightened and hedged, and his estimates of H must be discarded, but his general idea will be shown to be correct. We have shown elsewhere that this behavior of R / S means that the strength of long‐range statistical dependence in geophysical records is considerable.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1029/wr005i002p00321",
    doi = "10.1029/wr005i002p00321",
    openalex = "W2051347137"
}

A detailed curve of ice volume versus time is needed in order to test the validity of the hypothesis that changes in the earth's orbital parameters are the cause of oscillations in Pleistocene climate. Although absolute ages available for glacial moraines and raised coral reefs provide a number of key points, they by no means allow a continuous curve to be drawn. Those points that exist, however, are entirely consistent with the hypothesis that the O 18 /O 16 curves from deep‐sea cores provide good approximations to the ice volume record. If so, then the primary glacial cycle must be sawtoothed in character; gradual glacial buildups over periods averaging 90,000 years in length are terminated by deglaciations completed in less than one tenth this time. Modulating this primary cycle are secondary oscillations. Those recognized during glacial growth phases average 20,000 years in length and those during the retreats about one thousand years in length. When the ice volume curve obtained in this way is compared with the summer insolation curve for the northern hemisphere, it is seen that the rapid deglaciations occur during times of unusually great seasonal contrast and that the secondary cycles modulating the glacial buildups closely parallel the insolation variations. Although these findings provide convincing evidence for the influence of orbital changes on climate, the cause of the primary sawtoothed cycle is still an open question. In conjunction with this study, we have determined the O 18 /O 16 record for Caribbean core V12‐122 and find it to be compatible with those given by Emiliani for cores P6304‐8 and P6304‐9. Our dating of this core by Pa 231 ‐Th 230 and by magnetic reversals, however, strongly suggests that the absolute time scale adopted by Emiliani for deep‐sea cores must be increased by 25%.

@article{doi101029rg008i001p00169,
    author = "Broecker, Wallace S. and van Donk, Jan",
    title = "Insolation changes, ice volumes, and the O 18 record in deep‐sea cores",
    year = "1970",
    journal = "Reviews of Geophysics",
    abstract = "A detailed curve of ice volume versus time is needed in order to test the validity of the hypothesis that changes in the earth's orbital parameters are the cause of oscillations in Pleistocene climate. Although absolute ages available for glacial moraines and raised coral reefs provide a number of key points, they by no means allow a continuous curve to be drawn. Those points that exist, however, are entirely consistent with the hypothesis that the O 18 /O 16 curves from deep‐sea cores provide good approximations to the ice volume record. If so, then the primary glacial cycle must be sawtoothed in character; gradual glacial buildups over periods averaging 90,000 years in length are terminated by deglaciations completed in less than one tenth this time. Modulating this primary cycle are secondary oscillations. Those recognized during glacial growth phases average 20,000 years in length and those during the retreats about one thousand years in length. When the ice volume curve obtained in this way is compared with the summer insolation curve for the northern hemisphere, it is seen that the rapid deglaciations occur during times of unusually great seasonal contrast and that the secondary cycles modulating the glacial buildups closely parallel the insolation variations. Although these findings provide convincing evidence for the influence of orbital changes on climate, the cause of the primary sawtoothed cycle is still an open question. In conjunction with this study, we have determined the O 18 /O 16 record for Caribbean core V12‐122 and find it to be compatible with those given by Emiliani for cores P6304‐8 and P6304‐9. Our dating of this core by Pa 231 ‐Th 230 and by magnetic reversals, however, strongly suggests that the absolute time scale adopted by Emiliani for deep‐sea cores must be increased by 25\%.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1029/rg008i001p00169",
    doi = "10.1029/rg008i001p00169",
    openalex = "W1974828561",
    references = "broecker1958radiocarbon, broecker1965radiocarbon, doi101029jb073i006p02271, doi101029jz071i014p03379, doi101038215015a0, doi101086626295, doi101086627150, doi101086627434, doi101126science1593812297, doi101126science16238581121, doi101126science16238591227, doi101126science1633864237, doi101130001676061958691009rcolla20co2, doi1015159781400876525046, doi102475ajs2586429"
}

ABSTRACT The vertical and lateral stratigraphic relations of facies and facies associations, palaeocurrent directions, and geometry and internal organization of associated thick‐bedded and coarse‐grained bodies of sandstone provide the framework for distinguishing five thin‐bedded turbidite facies in the Eocene Hecho Group, south‐central Pyrenees, Spain. Each facies is characterized by a number of primary features which are palaeoenvironmental indicators by themselves. These features and their palaeoenvironmental significance are summarized below. The impressive regularity and lateral persistence of bedding and depositional structures, combined with the association of thin hemipelagic intercalations are typical characteristics of the basin plain thin‐bedded turbidites. Lateral variations in bed thickness, internal structures, grain size, sand: shale ratio, and amounts of hemipelagic intercalations are present in these sediments, but take place so gradually that they cannot generally be recognized at the scale of even very large exposures. The basin plain facies has a remarkable character of uniformity over great distances and considerable stratigraphic thicknesses. Thickening‐upward and/or symmetric cycles with individual thicknesses ranging from a few metres to a few tens of metres are typical of lobe‐fringe thin‐bedded turbidites. The sediments that comprise the cycles contain small but recognizable variations in bed thickness and sand: shale ratio. The diagnostic cyclic pattern can be detected in relatively small exposures. It should be noted that in absence of coarse‐grained and thick‐bedded sandstone of the depositional lobes the above cyclic pattern is diagnostic of fan‐fringe areas. An extremely irregular bedding pattern with lensing, wedding, and amalgamation of individual beds over very short distances, sharp rippled tops of many beds, and internal depositional structures indicative of mainly tractional processes without substantial fallout, are typical and exclusive characteristics of channelmouth thin‐bedded turbidites. Bundles of interbedded thin‐bedded sandstone and mudstone as thick as a few metres that are separated in vertical sequences by mudstone units of roughly similar or greater thickness are typical of interchannel thin‐bedded turbidites. The most diagnostic feature of this depositional environment is the presence of beds of sandstone filling broad shallow channels as probable crevasse‐splays. Thin, thoroughly rippled sandstone beds with marked divergence of the bedding attitude characterize the channel‐margin facies. The divergence or expansion in thickness, is consistently toward the channel axis. Small and shallow channels filled with thin‐bedded deposits, interpreted here as crevasses cut into channel edges or levees during period of severe overbanking are also characteristic.

@article{doi101111j136530911977tb00122x,
    author = "Mutti, Emiliano",
    title = "Distinctive thin‐bedded turbidite facies and related depositional environments in the Eocene Hecho Group (South‐central Pyrenees, Spain)",
    year = "1977",
    journal = "Sedimentology",
    abstract = "ABSTRACT The vertical and lateral stratigraphic relations of facies and facies associations, palaeocurrent directions, and geometry and internal organization of associated thick‐bedded and coarse‐grained bodies of sandstone provide the framework for distinguishing five thin‐bedded turbidite facies in the Eocene Hecho Group, south‐central Pyrenees, Spain. Each facies is characterized by a number of primary features which are palaeoenvironmental indicators by themselves. These features and their palaeoenvironmental significance are summarized below. The impressive regularity and lateral persistence of bedding and depositional structures, combined with the association of thin hemipelagic intercalations are typical characteristics of the basin plain thin‐bedded turbidites. Lateral variations in bed thickness, internal structures, grain size, sand: shale ratio, and amounts of hemipelagic intercalations are present in these sediments, but take place so gradually that they cannot generally be recognized at the scale of even very large exposures. The basin plain facies has a remarkable character of uniformity over great distances and considerable stratigraphic thicknesses. Thickening‐upward and/or symmetric cycles with individual thicknesses ranging from a few metres to a few tens of metres are typical of lobe‐fringe thin‐bedded turbidites. The sediments that comprise the cycles contain small but recognizable variations in bed thickness and sand: shale ratio. The diagnostic cyclic pattern can be detected in relatively small exposures. It should be noted that in absence of coarse‐grained and thick‐bedded sandstone of the depositional lobes the above cyclic pattern is diagnostic of fan‐fringe areas. An extremely irregular bedding pattern with lensing, wedding, and amalgamation of individual beds over very short distances, sharp rippled tops of many beds, and internal depositional structures indicative of mainly tractional processes without substantial fallout, are typical and exclusive characteristics of channelmouth thin‐bedded turbidites. Bundles of interbedded thin‐bedded sandstone and mudstone as thick as a few metres that are separated in vertical sequences by mudstone units of roughly similar or greater thickness are typical of interchannel thin‐bedded turbidites. The most diagnostic feature of this depositional environment is the presence of beds of sandstone filling broad shallow channels as probable crevasse‐splays. Thin, thoroughly rippled sandstone beds with marked divergence of the bedding attitude characterize the channel‐margin facies. The divergence or expansion in thickness, is consistently toward the channel axis. Small and shallow channels filled with thin‐bedded deposits, interpreted here as crevasses cut into channel edges or levees during period of severe overbanking are also characteristic.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-3091.1977.tb00122.x",
    doi = "10.1111/j.1365-3091.1977.tb00122.x",
    openalex = "W2162397024",
    references = "doi1010079783642962912, doi1010160025322770900447, doi1010160025322772900734, doi101111j136530911975tb01638x, doi101111j136530911976tb00038x, doi101306212f6cb72b2411d78648000102c1865d, doi1013065d25b6a516c111d78645000102c1865d, doi1013065d25cc7916c111d78645000102c1865d, doi10130674d716452b2111d78648000102c1865d, doi102110pec65080034"
}

Papers from a research symposium at the 1975 American Association of Petroleum Geologists and supplemented by later reports became “Seismic Stratigraphy Applications to Hydrocarbon Exploration”, one of AAPG’s best-selling book publications. Dramatic improvements in seismic imaging were demonstrated, a result of developments in seismic data quality and the processing capability of electronic technology. Twenty-eight articles are grouped into three sections. The first describes principles that both permit and also limit interpretations. The second section presents sixteen articles that describe the qualitative approach to stratigraphic interpretations of reflection records, and the final section presents techniques and examples of modeling. Of particular interest are a series of eleven papers in the second section under the subject heading of “Seismic stratigraphy and global changes of sea level”. Prepared by P. R. Vail, R. M. Mitchum and others from Exxon, they describe the regional unconformities and stratigraphic changes resulting from sea level fluctuations, and the manner in which these changes can be interpreted from seismic surveys. For many individuals within the oil industry who purchased this book, it was their first introduction to the modern concept of sequence stratigraphy that would have a major impact on the methodology of petroleum exploration.

@incollection{doi101306m26490c4,
    author = "Mitchum, R. M. and Vail, Peter R. and Thompson, S.",
    title = "Seismic Stratigraphy and Global Changes of Sea Level, Part 2 The Depositional Sequence as a Basic Unit for Stratigraphic Analysis 1",
    year = "1977",
    booktitle = "American Association of Petroleum Geologists eBooks",
    abstract = "Papers from a research symposium at the 1975 American Association of Petroleum Geologists and supplemented by later reports became “Seismic Stratigraphy Applications to Hydrocarbon Exploration”, one of AAPG’s best-selling book publications. Dramatic improvements in seismic imaging were demonstrated, a result of developments in seismic data quality and the processing capability of electronic technology. Twenty-eight articles are grouped into three sections. The first describes principles that both permit and also limit interpretations. The second section presents sixteen articles that describe the qualitative approach to stratigraphic interpretations of reflection records, and the final section presents techniques and examples of modeling. Of particular interest are a series of eleven papers in the second section under the subject heading of “Seismic stratigraphy and global changes of sea level”. Prepared by P. R. Vail, R. M. Mitchum and others from Exxon, they describe the regional unconformities and stratigraphic changes resulting from sea level fluctuations, and the manner in which these changes can be interpreted from seismic surveys. For many individuals within the oil industry who purchased this book, it was their first introduction to the modern concept of sequence stratigraphy that would have a major impact on the methodology of petroleum exploration.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1306/m26490c4",
    doi = "10.1306/m26490c4",
    openalex = "W2596074325"
}

(1978). Turbidites of the northern Apennines: introduction to facies analysis. International Geology Review: Vol. 20, No. 2, pp. 125-166.

@article{doi10108000206817809471524,
    author = "Mutti, Emiliano and Lucchi, Federico",
    title = "Turbidites of the northern Apennines: introduction to facies analysis",
    year = "1978",
    journal = "International Geology Review",
    abstract = "(1978). Turbidites of the northern Apennines: introduction to facies analysis. International Geology Review: Vol. 20, No. 2, pp. 125-166.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1080/00206817809471524",
    doi = "10.1080/00206817809471524",
    openalex = "W2052361478",
    references = "doi101007978140203609529, doi1010160025322767900515, doi101111j136530911977tb00122x, doi101126science1523721502, doi101130001676061959701089tifotp20co2, doi101130001676061969801859dfpap20co2, doi101139e67025, doi10130674d716452b2111d78648000102c1865d, doi102110pec65080192, openalexw3120543430, openalexw574363047, openalexw580680426, scott1966sedimentology"
}

Abstract Five main facies of deep-water clastic rocks can be defined: classic turbidites, massive sandstones, pebbly sandstones, conglomerates, and debris flows (with slumps and slides). The classic turbidites consist of monotonously parallel-interbedded sandstones and shales without channeling; internal sedimentary structures include grading, parallel lamination, and cross-lamination. Massive sandstones are thicker, coarser, and commonly channelized. They lack the sedimentary structures of classic turbidites, but do contain evidence of dewatering during deposition. Pebbly sandstones tend to be well graded, and can contain parallel stratification and large-scale cross-stratification. Conglomerates are characterized by inverse and normal grading, parallel and cross-stratification, and commonly have a preferred clast fabric (imbrication). Both the pebbly sandstones and conglomerates commonly are channelized. The facies can be fitted into a model of submarine-fan deposition. Modern fans are subdivided into an upper fan (suprafan), characterized by (1) a single deep channel with levees, (2) a middle fan, built up from suprafan lobes that periodically switch in position, and (3) a topographically smooth lower fan. The suprafan lobes have shallow, braided channels on their inner parts, but the outer suprafan lobes are smooth, and grade basinward into the smooth lower fan and basin plain. The smooth suprafan lobes and lower fan are characterized by deposition of the classic turbidite facies, and the braided part of the suprafan lobes by massive and pebbly sandstones. When one lobe is abandoned and another starts to prograde elsewhere, the first lobe is blanketed by mud, forming a potential stratigraphic trap. The upper-fan channel is an area of coarse sediment deposition, or conglomerates where gravel and boulders are supplied to the basin. During fan progradation, thickening- and coarsening-upward facies sequences can be formed in a manner analogous to those of deltas. Fan channels also can be abandoned progressively, forming thinning- and fining-upward sequences similar to those of fluvial or distributary channels. These sequences can be identified on electric logs. Where basin shales act as hydrocarbon-source areas, the classic turbidites can act as conduits, leading the hydrocarbons to the thicker, laterally coalesced massive and pebbly sandstones of the braided suprafan lobes. These bodies can be of the order of 25 km in diameter, and up to 100 m thick. The coarse deposits of the upper-fan channel also might form good reservoirs, being bounded by shales (levee deposits) on either side, and possibly by shales above if the fan-channel system is abandoned. Such channels can be tens of kilometers long, several kilometers wide, and a few hundred meters deep. Reservoirs may be present in all of these environments.

@article{doi101306c1ea4f7716c911d78645000102c1865d,
    author = "Walker, Roger G.",
    title = "Deep-Water Sandstone Facies and Ancient Submarine Fans: Models for Exploration for Stratigraphic Traps",
    year = "1978",
    journal = "AAPG Bulletin",
    abstract = "Abstract Five main facies of deep-water clastic rocks can be defined: classic turbidites, massive sandstones, pebbly sandstones, conglomerates, and debris flows (with slumps and slides). The classic turbidites consist of monotonously parallel-interbedded sandstones and shales without channeling; internal sedimentary structures include grading, parallel lamination, and cross-lamination. Massive sandstones are thicker, coarser, and commonly channelized. They lack the sedimentary structures of classic turbidites, but do contain evidence of dewatering during deposition. Pebbly sandstones tend to be well graded, and can contain parallel stratification and large-scale cross-stratification. Conglomerates are characterized by inverse and normal grading, parallel and cross-stratification, and commonly have a preferred clast fabric (imbrication). Both the pebbly sandstones and conglomerates commonly are channelized. The facies can be fitted into a model of submarine-fan deposition. Modern fans are subdivided into an upper fan (suprafan), characterized by (1) a single deep channel with levees, (2) a middle fan, built up from suprafan lobes that periodically switch in position, and (3) a topographically smooth lower fan. The suprafan lobes have shallow, braided channels on their inner parts, but the outer suprafan lobes are smooth, and grade basinward into the smooth lower fan and basin plain. The smooth suprafan lobes and lower fan are characterized by deposition of the classic turbidite facies, and the braided part of the suprafan lobes by massive and pebbly sandstones. When one lobe is abandoned and another starts to prograde elsewhere, the first lobe is blanketed by mud, forming a potential stratigraphic trap. The upper-fan channel is an area of coarse sediment deposition, or conglomerates where gravel and boulders are supplied to the basin. During fan progradation, thickening- and coarsening-upward facies sequences can be formed in a manner analogous to those of deltas. Fan channels also can be abandoned progressively, forming thinning- and fining-upward sequences similar to those of fluvial or distributary channels. These sequences can be identified on electric logs. Where basin shales act as hydrocarbon-source areas, the classic turbidites can act as conduits, leading the hydrocarbons to the thicker, laterally coalesced massive and pebbly sandstones of the braided suprafan lobes. These bodies can be of the order of 25 km in diameter, and up to 100 m thick. The coarse deposits of the upper-fan channel also might form good reservoirs, being bounded by shales (levee deposits) on either side, and possibly by shales above if the fan-channel system is abandoned. Such channels can be tens of kilometers long, several kilometers wide, and a few hundred meters deep. Reservoirs may be present in all of these environments.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1306/c1ea4f77-16c9-11d7-8645000102c1865d",
    doi = "10.1306/c1ea4f77-16c9-11d7-8645000102c1865d",
    openalex = "W4253862311",
    references = "doi101086625710, doi101111j136530911975tb00290x, doi101111j136530911976tb00051x, doi101111j136530911977tb00122x, doi10113000167606195970279tdispa20co2, doi101130001676061969801859dfpap20co2, doi10113000167606197586737gfmfrc20co2, doi101144pygs3511, doi101306212f6cb72b2411d78648000102c1865d, doi1013065d25c61516c111d78645000102c1865d, doi1013065d25cc7916c111d78645000102c1865d, doi10130674d716452b2111d78648000102c1865d"
}

Five main facies of deep-water clastic rocks can be defined: classic turbidites, massive sandstones, pebbly sandstones, conglomerates, and debris flows (with slumps and slides). The classic turbidites consist of monotonously parallel-interbedded sandstones and shales without channeling; internal sedimentary structures include grading, parallel lamination, and cross-lamination. Massive sandstones are thicker, coarser, and commonly channelized. They lack the sedimentary structures of classic turbidites, but do contain evidence of dewatering during deposition. Pebbly sandstones tend to be well graded, and can contain parallel stratification and large-scale cross-stratification. Conglomerates are characterized by inverse and normal grading, parallel and cross-stratification, nd commonly have a preferred clast fabric (imbrication). Both the pebbly sandstones and conglomerates commonly are channelized. The facies can be fitted into a model of submarine-fan deposition. Modern fans are subdivided into an upper fan (suprafan), characterized by (1) a single deep channel with levees, (2) a middle fan, built up from suprafan lobes that periodically switch in position, and (3) a topographically smooth lower fan. The suprafan lobes have shallow, braided channels on their inner parts, but the outer suprafan lobes are smooth, and grade basinward into the smooth lower fan and basin plain. The smooth suprafan lobes and lower fan are characterized by deposition of the classic turbidite facies, and the braided part of the suprafan lobes by massive and pebbly sandstones. When one lobe is abandoned and another starts to prograde elsewhere, the first lobe is blanketed by mud, forming a potential stratigraphic trap. The upper-fan channel is an area of coarse sediment deposition, or conglomerates where gravel and boulders are supplied to the basin. During fan progradation, thickening- and coarsening-upward facies sequences can be formed in a manner analogous to those of deltas. Fan channels also can be abandoned progressively, forming thinning- and fining-upward sequences similar to those of fluvial or distributary channels. These sequences can be identified on electric logs. Where basin shales act as hydrocarbon-source areas, the classic turbidites can act as conduits, leading the hydrocarbons to the thicker, laterally coalesced massive and pebbly sandstones of the braided suprafan lobes. These bodies can be of the order of 25 km in diameter, and up to 100 m thick. The coarse deposits of the upper-fan channel also might form good reservoirs, being bounded by shales (levee deposits) on either side, and possibly by shales above if the fan-channel system is abandoned. Such channels can be tens of kilometers long, several kilometers wide, and a few hundred meters deep. Reservoirs may be present in all of these environments.

@article{doi1013062f9182e316ce11d78645000102c1865d,
    author = "Aalto, K. R.",
    title = "Deep-Water Sandstone Facies and Ancient Submarine Fans: Models for Exploration for Stratigraphic Traps: Discussion",
    year = "1979",
    journal = "AAPG Bulletin",
    abstract = "Five main facies of deep-water clastic rocks can be defined: classic turbidites, massive sandstones, pebbly sandstones, conglomerates, and debris flows (with slumps and slides). The classic turbidites consist of monotonously parallel-interbedded sandstones and shales without channeling; internal sedimentary structures include grading, parallel lamination, and cross-lamination. Massive sandstones are thicker, coarser, and commonly channelized. They lack the sedimentary structures of classic turbidites, but do contain evidence of dewatering during deposition. Pebbly sandstones tend to be well graded, and can contain parallel stratification and large-scale cross-stratification. Conglomerates are characterized by inverse and normal grading, parallel and cross-stratification, nd commonly have a preferred clast fabric (imbrication). Both the pebbly sandstones and conglomerates commonly are channelized. The facies can be fitted into a model of submarine-fan deposition. Modern fans are subdivided into an upper fan (suprafan), characterized by (1) a single deep channel with levees, (2) a middle fan, built up from suprafan lobes that periodically switch in position, and (3) a topographically smooth lower fan. The suprafan lobes have shallow, braided channels on their inner parts, but the outer suprafan lobes are smooth, and grade basinward into the smooth lower fan and basin plain. The smooth suprafan lobes and lower fan are characterized by deposition of the classic turbidite facies, and the braided part of the suprafan lobes by massive and pebbly sandstones. When one lobe is abandoned and another starts to prograde elsewhere, the first lobe is blanketed by mud, forming a potential stratigraphic trap. The upper-fan channel is an area of coarse sediment deposition, or conglomerates where gravel and boulders are supplied to the basin. During fan progradation, thickening- and coarsening-upward facies sequences can be formed in a manner analogous to those of deltas. Fan channels also can be abandoned progressively, forming thinning- and fining-upward sequences similar to those of fluvial or distributary channels. These sequences can be identified on electric logs. Where basin shales act as hydrocarbon-source areas, the classic turbidites can act as conduits, leading the hydrocarbons to the thicker, laterally coalesced massive and pebbly sandstones of the braided suprafan lobes. These bodies can be of the order of 25 km in diameter, and up to 100 m thick. The coarse deposits of the upper-fan channel also might form good reservoirs, being bounded by shales (levee deposits) on either side, and possibly by shales above if the fan-channel system is abandoned. Such channels can be tens of kilometers long, several kilometers wide, and a few hundred meters deep. Reservoirs may be present in all of these environments.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1306/2f9182e3-16ce-11d7-8645000102c1865d",
    doi = "10.1306/2f9182e3-16ce-11d7-8645000102c1865d",
    openalex = "W2056452793",
    references = "doi1010160016714277900096, doi101086625710, doi101111j136530911975tb00290x, doi101111j136530911976tb00051x, doi101111j136530911977tb00122x, doi101130001676061969801859dfpap20co2, doi10113000167606197586737gfmfrc20co2, doi1013065d25c0f916c111d78645000102c1865d, doi1013065d25c2d316c111d78645000102c1865d, doi1013065d25c61516c111d78645000102c1865d, doi1013065d25cc7916c111d78645000102c1865d, doi10130674d7262b2b2111d78648000102c1865d, doi102110scn7502, openalexw3120543430, paine1968stratigraphy"
}

Abstract Significant short-term carbon isotope fluctuations are present in Cretaceous pelagic limestones from widely distributed onshore sections in the Circum–Atlantic-western Tethyan region. More than 1,000 closely spaced samples were analyzed during this study. At least seven major δ13C excursions can be correlated from section to section. The most important “heavy events” occur near the Aptian-Albian and Cenomanian-Turonian boundaries, whereas “light events” are near the Jurassic-Cretaceous, Albian-Cenomanian, Turonian-Coniacian, and Cretaceous-Tertiary boundaries. The association of “events” with stage boundaries and the consistent correlation of “events” between stratigraphic sections provides a significant new tool for time-rock correlation independent of standard biostratigraphic techniques. The temporal association of these carbon isotope events with stage boundaries (faunal and floral events), global eustatic sea-level variations, and oceanic “anoxic events” demonstrates the potential usefulness of carbon isotope studies in interpreting variations in paleo-oceanic circulation. Furthermore, the association of carbon isotope variations with anoxic events is potentially useful for evaluation of the precise timing and the magnitude of preservation of organic matter in deep-sea and continental-margin sediments. Thus, isotopic studies may aid in estimating potential hydrocarbon resources in largely unexplored oceanic basins or along continental margins.

@article{doi1013062f91892d16ce11d78645000102c1865d,
    author = "Scholle, Peter A. and Arthur, Michael A.",
    title = "Carbon Isotope Fluctuations in Cretaceous Pelagic Limestones: Potential Stratigraphic and Petroleum Exploration Tool",
    year = "1980",
    journal = "AAPG Bulletin",
    abstract = "Abstract Significant short-term carbon isotope fluctuations are present in Cretaceous pelagic limestones from widely distributed onshore sections in the Circum–Atlantic-western Tethyan region. More than 1,000 closely spaced samples were analyzed during this study. At least seven major δ13C excursions can be correlated from section to section. The most important “heavy events” occur near the Aptian-Albian and Cenomanian-Turonian boundaries, whereas “light events” are near the Jurassic-Cretaceous, Albian-Cenomanian, Turonian-Coniacian, and Cretaceous-Tertiary boundaries. The association of “events” with stage boundaries and the consistent correlation of “events” between stratigraphic sections provides a significant new tool for time-rock correlation independent of standard biostratigraphic techniques. The temporal association of these carbon isotope events with stage boundaries (faunal and floral events), global eustatic sea-level variations, and oceanic “anoxic events” demonstrates the potential usefulness of carbon isotope studies in interpreting variations in paleo-oceanic circulation. Furthermore, the association of carbon isotope variations with anoxic events is potentially useful for evaluation of the precise timing and the magnitude of preservation of organic matter in deep-sea and continental-margin sediments. Thus, isotopic studies may aid in estimating potential hydrocarbon resources in largely unexplored oceanic basins or along continental margins.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1306/2f91892d-16ce-11d7-8645000102c1865d",
    doi = "10.1306/2f91892d-16ce-11d7-8645000102c1865d",
    openalex = "W2104659005",
    references = "doi1010160031018268900473, doi101038269209a0, doi101086628336, doi10113000167606197788367ucmsag20co2, doi101144gsjgs13720171, doi101146annurevea05050177001535, doi10130683d923ed16c711d78645000102c1865d"
}

Data on numbers of marine families within 91 metazoan classes known from the Phanerozoic fossil record are analyzed. The distribution of the 2800 fossil families among the classes is very uneven, with most belonging to a small minority of classes. Similarly, the stratigraphic distribution of the classes is very uneven, with most first appearing early in the Paleozoic and with many of the smaller classes becoming extinct before the end of that era. However, despite this unevenness, a Q -mode factor analysis indicates that the structure of these data is rather simple. Only three factors are needed to account for more than 90% of the data. These factors are interpreted as reflecting the three great “evolutionary faunas” of the Phanerozoic marine record: a trilobite-dominated Cambrian fauna, a brachiopod-dominated later Paleozoic fauna, and a mollusc-dominated Mesozoic-Cenozoic, or “modern,” fauna. Lesser factors relate to slow taxonomic turnover within the major faunas through time and to unique aspects of particular taxa and times. Each of the three major faunas seems to have its own characteristic diversity so that its expansion or contraction appears as being intimately associated with a particular phase in the history of total marine diversity. The Cambrian fauna expands rapidly during the Early Cambrian radiations and maintains dominance during the Middle to Late Cambrian “equilibrium.” The Paleozoic fauna then ascends to dominance during the Ordovician radiations, which increase diversity dramatically; this new fauna then maintains dominance throughout the long interval of apparent equilibrium that lasts until the end of the Paleozoic Era. The modern fauna, which slowly increases in importance during the Paleozoic Era, quickly rises to dominance with the Late Permian extinctions and maintains that status during the general rise in diversity to the apparent maximum in the Neogene. The increase in diversity associated with the expansion of each new fauna appears to coincide with an approximately exponential decline of the previously dominant fauna, suggesting possible displacement of each evolutionary fauna by its successor.

@article{doi101017s0094837300003778,
    author = "Sepkoski, J. John",
    title = "A factor analytic description of the Phanerozoic marine fossil record",
    year = "1981",
    journal = "Paleobiology",
    abstract = "Data on numbers of marine families within 91 metazoan classes known from the Phanerozoic fossil record are analyzed. The distribution of the 2800 fossil families among the classes is very uneven, with most belonging to a small minority of classes. Similarly, the stratigraphic distribution of the classes is very uneven, with most first appearing early in the Paleozoic and with many of the smaller classes becoming extinct before the end of that era. However, despite this unevenness, a Q -mode factor analysis indicates that the structure of these data is rather simple. Only three factors are needed to account for more than 90\% of the data. These factors are interpreted as reflecting the three great “evolutionary faunas” of the Phanerozoic marine record: a trilobite-dominated Cambrian fauna, a brachiopod-dominated later Paleozoic fauna, and a mollusc-dominated Mesozoic-Cenozoic, or “modern,” fauna. Lesser factors relate to slow taxonomic turnover within the major faunas through time and to unique aspects of particular taxa and times. Each of the three major faunas seems to have its own characteristic diversity so that its expansion or contraction appears as being intimately associated with a particular phase in the history of total marine diversity. The Cambrian fauna expands rapidly during the Early Cambrian radiations and maintains dominance during the Middle to Late Cambrian “equilibrium.” The Paleozoic fauna then ascends to dominance during the Ordovician radiations, which increase diversity dramatically; this new fauna then maintains dominance throughout the long interval of apparent equilibrium that lasts until the end of the Paleozoic Era. The modern fauna, which slowly increases in importance during the Paleozoic Era, quickly rises to dominance with the Late Permian extinctions and maintains that status during the general rise in diversity to the apparent maximum in the Neogene. The increase in diversity associated with the expansion of each new fauna appears to coincide with an approximately exponential decline of the previously dominant fauna, suggesting possible displacement of each evolutionary fauna by its successor.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1017/s0094837300003778",
    doi = "10.1017/s0094837300003778",
    openalex = "W2505144080",
    references = "doi10100797814613088367, doi1010160012825272900724, doi101017s0094837300004917, doi101017s009483730000508x, doi101017s0094837300005236, doi101017s0094837300005352, doi101017s0094837300005649, doi101017s0094837300005972, doi101017s0094837300012549, doi101126science17740541065, doi101126science2064415217, doi101130spe89p63, doi1023071483846, doi1023071796560, doi1023072405671, doi1023072412725, doi1023072412728, doi1023072806339, doi107312simp93764, openalexw1504049102, openalexw645218623"
}

A compilation of nearly 25,000 rates of sediment accumulation shows that they are extremely variable, spanning at least 11 orders of magnitude. Much of this variation results from compiling rates determined for different time spans: there is a systematic trend of falling mean rate with increasing time span. The gradients of such trends vary with environment of deposition. Although measurement error and compaction contribute to these regressions, they are primarily the consequence of unsteady, discontinuous sedimentation. The essential character of the unsteadiness may be cyclic or random, but net accumulation is characterized by fluctuations whose magnitudes increase with increasing recurrence interval. Ratios of median long- to short-term accumulation rates provide a measure of the expected completeness of sedimentary stratigraphic sections, at the time scale of the short-term rate. Expected completeness deteriorates as finer time scales are considered.

@article{doi101086628623,
    author = "Sadler, Peter M.",
    title = "Sediment Accumulation Rates and the Completeness of Stratigraphic Sections",
    year = "1981",
    journal = "The Journal of Geology",
    abstract = "A compilation of nearly 25,000 rates of sediment accumulation shows that they are extremely variable, spanning at least 11 orders of magnitude. Much of this variation results from compiling rates determined for different time spans: there is a systematic trend of falling mean rate with increasing time span. The gradients of such trends vary with environment of deposition. Although measurement error and compaction contribute to these regressions, they are primarily the consequence of unsteady, discontinuous sedimentation. The essential character of the unsteadiness may be cyclic or random, but net accumulation is characterized by fluctuations whose magnitudes increase with increasing recurrence interval. Ratios of median long- to short-term accumulation rates provide a measure of the expected completeness of sedimentary stratigraphic sections, at the time scale of the short-term rate. Expected completeness deteriorates as finer time scales are considered.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1086/628623",
    doi = "10.1086/628623",
    openalex = "W2045443252",
    references = "doi1010160016003258906884, doi1010160040195176900044, doi101029wr005i002p00321, doi101086626637, doi10111513601282, doi101130gsab28745, doi101306212f6f3c2b2411d78648000102c1865d, doi104324978020337108412, openalexw3135630760, openalexw3216143596"
}

@misc{hallam1981facies1,
    author = "Hallam, A",
    title = "Facies Interpretation and the Stratigraphic Record",
    year = "1981",
    howpublished = "Oxford, Freeman",
    note = "talkorigins\_source = {true}; raw\_reference = {Hallam, A., 1981, Facies Interpretation and the Stratigraphic Record: Oxford, Freeman.}"
}

@book{openalexw597633443,
    author = "Hallam, Anthony",
    title = "Facies interpretation and the stratigraphic record",
    year = "1981",
    url = "https://openalex.org/W597633443",
    openalex = "W597633443"
}

This book is a short, readable, and interesting introduction to facies analysis—or as Hallam prefers to call it, facies interpretation—in the form of an advanced undergraduate to beginning graduate level textbook. Unlike conventional textbooks on the subject, the emphasis here is not so much on the basics of sedimentation and stratigraphy as on applying the basics to sweeping, large‐scale problems in tectonics, paleo‐oceanography, paleoclimatology, and the history of life. This is not a comprehensive textbook. One must know the basics to appreciate it fully. But its very brevity and portability combine with its extensive bibliography to make it a particularly useful guide to recent work.

@article{cisne1982facies,
    author = "Cisne, John",
    title = "Facies Interpretation and the Stratigraphic Record",
    year = "1982",
    journal = "Eos, Transactions American Geophysical Union",
    abstract = "This book is a short, readable, and interesting introduction to facies analysis—or as Hallam prefers to call it, facies interpretation—in the form of an advanced undergraduate to beginning graduate level textbook. Unlike conventional textbooks on the subject, the emphasis here is not so much on the basics of sedimentation and stratigraphy as on applying the basics to sweeping, large‐scale problems in tectonics, paleo‐oceanography, paleoclimatology, and the history of life. This is not a comprehensive textbook. One must know the basics to appreciate it fully. But its very brevity and portability combine with its extensive bibliography to make it a particularly useful guide to recent work.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1029/eo063i023p00529-06",
    doi = "10.1029/eo063i023p00529-06",
    number = "23",
    openalex = "W2027736468",
    pages = "529-530",
    volume = "63"
}

@article{doi1010160191814182900463,
    author = "Roberts, David E.",
    title = "Facies interpretation and the stratigraphic record",
    year = "1982",
    journal = "Journal of Structural Geology",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1016/0191-8141(82)90046-3",
    doi = "10.1016/0191-8141(82)90046-3",
    openalex = "W1636110355"
}

This book is a short, readable, and interesting introduction to facies analysis—or as Hallam prefers to call it, facies interpretation—in the form of an advanced undergraduate to beginning graduate level textbook. Unlike conventional textbooks on the subject, the emphasis here is not so much on the basics of sedimentation and stratigraphy as on applying the basics to sweeping, large‐scale problems in tectonics, paleo‐oceanography, paleoclimatology, and the history of life. This is not a comprehensive textbook. One must know the basics to appreciate it fully. But its very brevity and portability combine with its extensive bibliography to make it a particularly useful guide to recent work.

@article{doi101029eo063i023p0052906,
    author = "Cisne, John L.",
    title = "Facies Interpretation and the Stratigraphic Record",
    year = "1982",
    journal = "Eos",
    abstract = "This book is a short, readable, and interesting introduction to facies analysis—or as Hallam prefers to call it, facies interpretation—in the form of an advanced undergraduate to beginning graduate level textbook. Unlike conventional textbooks on the subject, the emphasis here is not so much on the basics of sedimentation and stratigraphy as on applying the basics to sweeping, large‐scale problems in tectonics, paleo‐oceanography, paleoclimatology, and the history of life. This is not a comprehensive textbook. One must know the basics to appreciate it fully. But its very brevity and portability combine with its extensive bibliography to make it a particularly useful guide to recent work.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1029/eo063i023p00529-06",
    doi = "10.1029/eo063i023p00529-06",
    openalex = "W2027736468"
}

Catastrophic hypotheses for mass extinctions are commonly criticized because many taxa gradually disappear from the fossil record prior to the extinction. Presumably, a geologically instantaneous catastrophe would not cause a reduction in diversity or a series of minor extinctions before the actual mass extinction. Two types of sampling effects, however, could cause taxa to appear to decline before their actual biotic extinction. The first of these is reduced sample size provided in the sedimentary record and the second, which we examine in greater detail, is artificial range truncation. The fossil record is discontinuous in time and the recorded ranges of species or of higher taxa can only extend to their last known occurrence in the fossil record. If the distribution of last occurrences is random with respect to actual biotic extinction, then apparent extinctions will begin well before a mass extinction and will gradually increase in frequency until the mass extinction event, thus giving the appearance of a gradual extinction. Other factors, such as regressions, can exacerbate the bias toward gradual disappearance of taxa from the fossil record. Hence, gradual extinction patterns prior to a mass extinction do not necessarily eliminate catastrophic extinction hypotheses. The recorded ranges of fossils, especially of uncommon taxa or taxa in habitats not represented by a continuous record, may be inadequate to test either gradual or catastrophic hypotheses.

@incollection{doi101130spe190p291,
    author = "Signor, Philip W. and Lipps, Jere H.",
    title = "Sampling bias, gradual extinction patterns and catastrophes in the fossil record",
    year = "1982",
    booktitle = "Geological Society of America eBooks",
    abstract = "Catastrophic hypotheses for mass extinctions are commonly criticized because many taxa gradually disappear from the fossil record prior to the extinction. Presumably, a geologically instantaneous catastrophe would not cause a reduction in diversity or a series of minor extinctions before the actual mass extinction. Two types of sampling effects, however, could cause taxa to appear to decline before their actual biotic extinction. The first of these is reduced sample size provided in the sedimentary record and the second, which we examine in greater detail, is artificial range truncation. The fossil record is discontinuous in time and the recorded ranges of species or of higher taxa can only extend to their last known occurrence in the fossil record. If the distribution of last occurrences is random with respect to actual biotic extinction, then apparent extinctions will begin well before a mass extinction and will gradually increase in frequency until the mass extinction event, thus giving the appearance of a gradual extinction. Other factors, such as regressions, can exacerbate the bias toward gradual disappearance of taxa from the fossil record. Hence, gradual extinction patterns prior to a mass extinction do not necessarily eliminate catastrophic extinction hypotheses. The recorded ranges of fossils, especially of uncommon taxa or taxa in habitats not represented by a continuous record, may be inadequate to test either gradual or catastrophic hypotheses.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1130/spe190-p291",
    doi = "10.1130/spe190-p291",
    openalex = "W2414724882"
}

@article{roberts1982facies,
    author = "Roberts, D.E.",
    title = "Facies interpretation and the stratigraphic record",
    year = "1982",
    journal = "Journal of Structural Geology",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1016/0191-8141(82)90046-3",
    doi = "10.1016/0191-8141(82)90046-3",
    number = "4",
    openalex = "W1636110355",
    pages = "507-508",
    volume = "4"
}

@article{tanner1982facies,
    author = "Tanner, William F.",
    title = "Facies Interpretation and the Stratigraphic Record",
    year = "1982",
    journal = "Sedimentary Geology",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1016/0037-0738(82)90031-8",
    doi = "10.1016/0037-0738(82)90031-8",
    number = "1",
    openalex = "W1567399692",
    pages = "75-77",
    volume = "33"
}

ABSTRACT Increased knowledge of modern glacial depositional environments has resulted in rapidly evolving classifications of glacial tills. These are based to a large degree on theoretical considerations of likely depositional processes. The classifications are sophisticated and more advanced than the establishment of simple field criteria whereby individual till facies can be identified in Quaternary and Pre‐Quaternary successions. This situation is compounded in many Quaternary terrains by the continued description of ‘tills’ in terms of laboratory‐derived analytical data only, reflecting a traditional interest in stratigraphic correlation rather than reconstruction of depositional environment. Detailed sedimentological logging of lithofacies is rarely undertaken. There is thus considerable confusion as to what is being described or sampled when analytical data are presented for many Pleistocene ‘tills’. The same remarks apply to Pre‐Pleistocene ‘tillites’. A lithofacies code is presented here for the rapid description and visual appraisal of field sequences or drill cores containing unconsolidated diamicts or lithified diamictites; the term‘till’is not used as it has a strict genetic definition referring to direct aggregation and deposition by glacier ice. Use of a four part code, in conjunction with codes already published for fluvial sediments, allows fundamental field properties to be depicted independent of genetic terminology and provides a firm basis for subsequent environmental interpretation and analytical work. The value of this approach is illustrated by comparing a representative suite of vertical profiles of diamict assemblages deposited by modern grounded glaciers with a classic late Pleistocene glacigenic sequence at Scarborough Bluffs, Ontario.

@article{doi101111j136530911983tb00679x,
    author = "Eyles, N. and Eyles, Carolyn H. and Miall, Andrew D.",
    title = "Lithofacies types and vertical profile models; an alternative approach to the description and environmental interpretation of glacial diamict and diamictite sequences",
    year = "1983",
    journal = "Sedimentology",
    abstract = "ABSTRACT Increased knowledge of modern glacial depositional environments has resulted in rapidly evolving classifications of glacial tills. These are based to a large degree on theoretical considerations of likely depositional processes. The classifications are sophisticated and more advanced than the establishment of simple field criteria whereby individual till facies can be identified in Quaternary and Pre‐Quaternary successions. This situation is compounded in many Quaternary terrains by the continued description of ‘tills’ in terms of laboratory‐derived analytical data only, reflecting a traditional interest in stratigraphic correlation rather than reconstruction of depositional environment. Detailed sedimentological logging of lithofacies is rarely undertaken. There is thus considerable confusion as to what is being described or sampled when analytical data are presented for many Pleistocene ‘tills’. The same remarks apply to Pre‐Pleistocene ‘tillites’. A lithofacies code is presented here for the rapid description and visual appraisal of field sequences or drill cores containing unconsolidated diamicts or lithified diamictites; the term‘till’is not used as it has a strict genetic definition referring to direct aggregation and deposition by glacier ice. Use of a four part code, in conjunction with codes already published for fluvial sediments, allows fundamental field properties to be depicted independent of genetic terminology and provides a firm basis for subsequent environmental interpretation and analytical work. The value of this approach is illustrated by comparing a representative suite of vertical profiles of diamict assemblages deposited by modern grounded glaciers with a classic late Pleistocene glacigenic sequence at Scarborough Bluffs, Ontario.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-3091.1983.tb00679.x",
    doi = "10.1111/j.1365-3091.1983.tb00679.x",
    openalex = "W2091643973",
    references = "doi1010160012825273900226, doi1010160012825277900551, doi101016001282527990059x, doi1010160025322779900860, doi101017s0022143000015306, doi101111j136530911978tb00329x, doi101111j150238851982tb00541x, doi10113000167606197586737gfmfrc20co2, doi101139e77020, doi101144gslqjeg19810140204, doi1023071550407, doi1023073514634, zimmerle1979the"
}

@article{friend1983book,
    author = "Friend, P.F.",
    title = "Book reviews: Hallam, A. 1981: Facies interpretation and the stratigraphic record. San Francisco: Freeman. 291 pp. £10.95",
    year = "1983",
    journal = "Progress in Physical Geography: Earth and Environment",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1177/030913338300700315",
    doi = "10.1177/030913338300700315",
    number = "3",
    openalex = "W2041535044",
    pages = "443-444",
    volume = "7",
    references = "doi1010160025322779900860"
}

Summary Based on a large amount of published data and stimulated by the papers and discussion at the International Workshop on Fine-Grained Sediments held in Halifax, Canada in August 1982, we have attempted a synthesis of deep-water fine-grained sediment facies. Three main facies groups related to depositional processes can be identified: turbidites, contourites and pelagites/hemipelagites. There is a continuum between the different processes and hence a continuum between facies. Nevertheless, it is possible to define several distinct facies models within each of these groups on the basis of sedimentary structures, texture and composition, and to provisionally interpret these in terms of depositional hydrodynamics. Patterns of horizontal and vertical facies distribution can be related to depositional subenvironments. There is much variability within and departure from the facies models we propose, and many interesting and problematic areas of research remain in the quest for better understanding of deep-water fine-grained sediments.

@article{doi101144gslsp19840150138,
    author = "Stow, Dorrik A. V. and Piper, David J. W.",
    title = "Deep-water fine-grained sediments: facies models",
    year = "1984",
    journal = "Geological Society London Special Publications",
    abstract = "Summary Based on a large amount of published data and stimulated by the papers and discussion at the International Workshop on Fine-Grained Sediments held in Halifax, Canada in August 1982, we have attempted a synthesis of deep-water fine-grained sediment facies. Three main facies groups related to depositional processes can be identified: turbidites, contourites and pelagites/hemipelagites. There is a continuum between the different processes and hence a continuum between facies. Nevertheless, it is possible to define several distinct facies models within each of these groups on the basis of sedimentary structures, texture and composition, and to provisionally interpret these in terms of depositional hydrodynamics. Patterns of horizontal and vertical facies distribution can be related to depositional subenvironments. There is much variability within and departure from the facies models we propose, and many interesting and problematic areas of research remain in the quest for better understanding of deep-water fine-grained sediments.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1144/gsl.sp.1984.015.01.38",
    doi = "10.1144/gsl.sp.1984.015.01.38",
    openalex = "W2040337214",
    references = "doi1010079783642758294, doi1010160025322767900515, doi1010160025322776900839, doi1010160025322778900944, doi1010160025322779900860, doi1010160037073880900524, doi10108000288306196910420225, doi101086627725, doi101306c1ea4f7716c911d78645000102c1865d"
}

According to the hypothesis of punctuated aggradational cycles presented here, the stratigraphic record consists of small-scale (1-5 m thick) shallowing-upward cycles (PACs) separated by surfaces marked by abrupt change to deeper facies. This motif, pervasive in time and environment, is produced by relatively long periods (tens of thousands of years) of base-level stability punctuated by geologically instantaneous relative base-level rises of at least basin-wide extent. As basin-wide lithologic time-stratigraphic units, PACs are fundamental to all aspects of stratigraphic analysis including correlation, paleoenvironmental interpretation, and paleogeographic reconstruction. Of several possible allogenic mechanisms for a pervasively cyclic stratigraphic record, glacial eustasy driven by orbital perturbations is preferred. The PAC hypothesis is presented as a comprehensive model to be tested and modified by examination of the stratigraphic record from an episodic perspective.

@article{doi101086628978,
    author = "Goodwin, Peter W. and Anderson, E. J.",
    title = "Punctuated Aggradational Cycles: A General Hypothesis of Episodic Stratigraphic Accumulation",
    year = "1985",
    journal = "The Journal of Geology",
    abstract = "According to the hypothesis of punctuated aggradational cycles presented here, the stratigraphic record consists of small-scale (1-5 m thick) shallowing-upward cycles (PACs) separated by surfaces marked by abrupt change to deeper facies. This motif, pervasive in time and environment, is produced by relatively long periods (tens of thousands of years) of base-level stability punctuated by geologically instantaneous relative base-level rises of at least basin-wide extent. As basin-wide lithologic time-stratigraphic units, PACs are fundamental to all aspects of stratigraphic analysis including correlation, paleoenvironmental interpretation, and paleogeographic reconstruction. Of several possible allogenic mechanisms for a pervasively cyclic stratigraphic record, glacial eustasy driven by orbital perturbations is preferred. The PAC hypothesis is presented as a comprehensive model to be tested and modified by examination of the stratigraphic record from an episodic perspective.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1086/628978",
    doi = "10.1086/628978",
    openalex = "W2049935947",
    references = "doi1010160079194661900040, doi101086628623, doi101111j136530911977tb00122x, doi101126science19442701121, doi101126science2074434943, doi101306m26490c5, doi101306m33429, doi1043249780203994627, openalexw2055911580, openalexw3135630760"
}

Facies alluvial sediments lakes deserts deltas siliciclastic shorelines arid shorelines and evaporites shallow siliciclastic seas shallow-marine carbonate environments pelagic environments deep clastic seas glacial environments sedimentation and tectonics problems and perspectives.

@article{doi1023073514634,
    author = "Bottjer, David J. and Reading, H. G.",
    title = "Sedimentary Environments and Facies",
    year = "1986",
    journal = "Palaios",
    abstract = "Facies alluvial sediments lakes deserts deltas siliciclastic shorelines arid shorelines and evaporites shallow siliciclastic seas shallow-marine carbonate environments pelagic environments deep clastic seas glacial environments sedimentation and tectonics problems and perspectives.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.2307/3514634",
    doi = "10.2307/3514634",
    openalex = "W2016486221"
}

Detailed paleogeographic studies in the Southern Alps suggest that an oxygen-minimum model is appropriate for interpreting conditions on Tethyan continental margins. Advection of manganese in this low-oxygen layer may explain the local occurrence of carbonate ores of this element. Carbon-sulfur and iron-sulfur ratios, although showing considerable scatter, suggest that bottom waters at this time were locally euxinic, containing free hydrogen sulfide. This Oceanic Anoxic Event was preceded by significant faunal turnover of ammonites in Tethys and accompanied by widespread extinction of benthos in northern Europe in response to the lateral spread of anoxic bottom waters during transgression. Similar changes may be recognized in other parts of the world. Other anoxic events may have taken place during the Jurassic, but documentation is as yet meagre. Furthermore, models for such phenomena remain largely speculative, although upwelling and increased planktonic productivity, commencing in pre-Toarcian time, are favored for the falciferum-Zone event documented here.-from Author

@article{doi102475ajs2882101,
    author = "Jenkyns, Hugh C.",
    title = "The early Toarcian (Jurassic) anoxic event; stratigraphic, sedimentary and geochemical evidence",
    year = "1988",
    journal = "American Journal of Science",
    abstract = "Detailed paleogeographic studies in the Southern Alps suggest that an oxygen-minimum model is appropriate for interpreting conditions on Tethyan continental margins. Advection of manganese in this low-oxygen layer may explain the local occurrence of carbonate ores of this element. Carbon-sulfur and iron-sulfur ratios, although showing considerable scatter, suggest that bottom waters at this time were locally euxinic, containing free hydrogen sulfide. This Oceanic Anoxic Event was preceded by significant faunal turnover of ammonites in Tethys and accompanied by widespread extinction of benthos in northern Europe in response to the lateral spread of anoxic bottom waters during transgression. Similar changes may be recognized in other parts of the world. Other anoxic events may have taken place during the Jurassic, but documentation is as yet meagre. Furthermore, models for such phenomena remain largely speculative, although upwelling and increased planktonic productivity, commencing in pre-Toarcian time, are favored for the falciferum-Zone event documented here.-from Author",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.2475/ajs.288.2.101",
    doi = "10.2475/ajs.288.2.101",
    openalex = "W2326669813"
}

ABSTRACT Marine basin margins are characterized by repetitive episodes of progradation punctuated by periods of transgression and flooding of the depositional platform. The resultant stratigraphic units consist of genetically related (1) depositional systems and their component facies sequences; (2) bypass, nondepositional, and erosional surfaces; and (3) in thick sequences affected by gravity tectonics and crustal response to loading, syndepositional structural discontinuities. Units are bounded by hiatal surfaces preserved as submarine unconformities or condensed sedimentary veneers and that record maximum marine flooding of the basin margin. The repetitive stratigraphic architecture is the product of the ongoing interplay among sediment supply, basin subsidence (and uplift), and eustatic sea level change. Each of these three variables may dominate depositional evolution; furthermore, stratigraphic architecture is very similar regardless of the dominant control. A genetic stratigraphic sequence is the sedimentary product of a depositional episode. The sequence incorporates and reconciles depositional systems, bedding geometries, and bounding surfaces within the framework of cycles of basin-margin offlap and flooding. Each sequence consists of the progradational, aggradational, and retrogradational or transgressive facies deposited during a period of regional paleogeographic stability. The defining genetic stratigraphic sequence boundary is a sedimentary veneer or surface that records the depositional hiatus that occurs over much of the transgressed shelf and adjacent slope during maximum marine flooding. The genetic sequence paradigm emphasizes preserving the stratigraphic integrity of three-dimensional depositional systems and does not rely on widespread development of subaerial erosion surfaces caused by eustatic falls of sea level to define sequence boundaries. The physical stratigraphic record of transgression and flooding—distinctive thin but widespread facies sequences, prominent erosional surfaces, and superjacent marine condensed intervals or sedimentary veneers—provides readily recognized, regionally correlative, easily and accurately datable, and robust sequence boundaries that commonly define times of major basin-margin paleogeographic reorganization in terrigenous clastic basins.

@article{doi101306703c9af5170711d78645000102c1865d,
    author = "Galloway, William E.",
    title = "Genetic Stratigraphic Sequences in Basin Analysis I: Architecture and Genesis of Flooding-Surface Bounded Depositional Units",
    year = "1989",
    journal = "AAPG Bulletin",
    abstract = "ABSTRACT Marine basin margins are characterized by repetitive episodes of progradation punctuated by periods of transgression and flooding of the depositional platform. The resultant stratigraphic units consist of genetically related (1) depositional systems and their component facies sequences; (2) bypass, nondepositional, and erosional surfaces; and (3) in thick sequences affected by gravity tectonics and crustal response to loading, syndepositional structural discontinuities. Units are bounded by hiatal surfaces preserved as submarine unconformities or condensed sedimentary veneers and that record maximum marine flooding of the basin margin. The repetitive stratigraphic architecture is the product of the ongoing interplay among sediment supply, basin subsidence (and uplift), and eustatic sea level change. Each of these three variables may dominate depositional evolution; furthermore, stratigraphic architecture is very similar regardless of the dominant control. A genetic stratigraphic sequence is the sedimentary product of a depositional episode. The sequence incorporates and reconciles depositional systems, bedding geometries, and bounding surfaces within the framework of cycles of basin-margin offlap and flooding. Each sequence consists of the progradational, aggradational, and retrogradational or transgressive facies deposited during a period of regional paleogeographic stability. The defining genetic stratigraphic sequence boundary is a sedimentary veneer or surface that records the depositional hiatus that occurs over much of the transgressed shelf and adjacent slope during maximum marine flooding. The genetic sequence paradigm emphasizes preserving the stratigraphic integrity of three-dimensional depositional systems and does not rely on widespread development of subaerial erosion surfaces caused by eustatic falls of sea level to define sequence boundaries. The physical stratigraphic record of transgression and flooding—distinctive thin but widespread facies sequences, prominent erosional surfaces, and superjacent marine condensed intervals or sedimentary veneers—provides readily recognized, regionally correlative, easily and accurately datable, and robust sequence boundaries that commonly define times of major basin-margin paleogeographic reorganization in terrigenous clastic basins.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1306/703c9af5-1707-11d7-8645000102c1865d",
    doi = "10.1306/703c9af5-1707-11d7-8645000102c1865d",
    openalex = "W2136493303",
    references = "doi1010079781475742350, doi101029jb085ib11p06113, doi1010970001069419510500000019, doi101126science23547931156, doi1011300016760619637493sitcio20co2, doi101130001676061978891389rbeass20co2, doi1013065d25cbb316c111d78645000102c1865d, doi101306m26490c4, doi102307211375, doi104324978020337108412, doi105724gcs84050109, flint1947geological, galloway1981depositional, openalexw1604095676"
}

Abstract The majority of British Jurassic dysaerobic and anaerobic facies (black shales) accumulated in rapidly subsiding basinal areas. Exceptionally, during the earliest stages of transgression, organic-rich facies expanded their distribution into more marginal areas. The biofacies of the black shales display a range of species richness values which, when ranked, record an oxygen gradient that is also reflected by gradients in geochemical and sedimentological data. Truly anaerobic facies (no benthic taxa present) are very rare in the British Jurassic. More common are fissile organic-rich shales with discrete, low-diversity horizons of benthos here defined as lower dysaerobic biofacies. These are interpreted to have formed in a generally anoxic environment punctuated by benthic colonization events in response to ephemeral improvements of oxygen levels. Upper dysaerobic biofacies are characterized by slightly higher diversity faunas scattered throughout poorly fissile strata. The favoured depositional model for the British Jurassic black shales attributes the high preservational values of organic carbon to accumulation in oxygen-deficient waters trapped beneath a stratified water column in the deepest, basinal areas. We propose an ‘expanding puddle’ model for transgressive black shales. Deep water conditions are envisaged to become proportionally more extensive during early transgression due to the combined effects of subsidence, a rapid rate of sea-level rise and, unique to this portion of the sea-level curve, sediment starvation.

@article{doi101144gslsp19910580119,
    author = "Wignall, Paul B. and Hallam, Anthony",
    title = "Biofacies, stratigraphic distribution and depositional models of British onshore Jurassic black shales",
    year = "1991",
    journal = "Geological Society London Special Publications",
    abstract = "Abstract The majority of British Jurassic dysaerobic and anaerobic facies (black shales) accumulated in rapidly subsiding basinal areas. Exceptionally, during the earliest stages of transgression, organic-rich facies expanded their distribution into more marginal areas. The biofacies of the black shales display a range of species richness values which, when ranked, record an oxygen gradient that is also reflected by gradients in geochemical and sedimentological data. Truly anaerobic facies (no benthic taxa present) are very rare in the British Jurassic. More common are fissile organic-rich shales with discrete, low-diversity horizons of benthos here defined as lower dysaerobic biofacies. These are interpreted to have formed in a generally anoxic environment punctuated by benthic colonization events in response to ephemeral improvements of oxygen levels. Upper dysaerobic biofacies are characterized by slightly higher diversity faunas scattered throughout poorly fissile strata. The favoured depositional model for the British Jurassic black shales attributes the high preservational values of organic carbon to accumulation in oxygen-deficient waters trapped beneath a stratified water column in the deepest, basinal areas. We propose an ‘expanding puddle’ model for transgressive black shales. Deep water conditions are envisaged to become proportionally more extensive during early transgression due to the combined effects of subsidence, a rapid rate of sea-level rise and, unique to this portion of the sea-level curve, sediment starvation.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1144/gsl.sp.1991.058.01.19",
    doi = "10.1144/gsl.sp.1991.058.01.19",
    openalex = "W2092067475",
    references = "doi1010160012825294900728, doi1010160146638080900170, doi1010160191814182900463, doi101111j150239311971tb01864x, doi1011300091761319880160452ibolim23co2, doi1013060bda5b8816bd11d78645000102c1865d, doi101306212f8e722b2411d78648000102c1865d, doi101306703c9af5170711d78645000102c1865d, doi102475ajs2858710, doi102475ajs2882101, doi1029830350340121u110, doi105860choice295709, openalexw597633443, roberts1982facies"
}

ABSTRACT Sequence stratigraphic concepts suggest that stratal geometries develop and are largely controlled by changes in relative sea level. On the shelf, lowstand deposits, which form during falls and subsequent stillstands of relative sea level, can be recognized by the presence of an unconformity at the base, the isolated and basinward position relative to the previous shoreline, and the abrupt seaward translation of shallow-water and shoreline facies into the basin across an unconformity surface. This seaward translation of facies and shoreline regression in response to relative sea level lowering is termed a “forced regression.” A forced regression is independent of variations of sediment flux and is in contrast with “normal” regressions that occur in response to excess sediment flux relative to space available on the shelf (i.e., accommodation). Forced regressions commonly are associated with a zone of sedimentary bypass, subaerial exposure, and possible fluvial erosion between the newly formed and preceding shorelines. Certain shelf sands, previously interpreted as offshore or mid-shelf sand bodies, thus can be reinterpreted as stranded lowstand shorelines associated with forced regressions. This alternative interpretation has economic significance insofar as it suggests different subsurface correlations and reservoir geometries with the potential for development of new play types and enhanced recovery in older fields. Examples of forced regression can be observed at a variety of scales and ages. Several such examples include the modern East Coulee fan delta and the Lower Cretaceous Viking Formation in Alberta, Canada, the Quaternary Rhône Delta, and the Quaternary Hudson Valley system.

@article{doi101306bdff8aa6171811d78645000102c1865d,
    author = "Posamentier, Henry W. and Allen, George P. and James, David P. and Tesson, Michel",
    title = "Forced Regressions in a Sequence Stratigraphic Framework: Concepts, Examples, and Exploration Significance",
    year = "1992",
    journal = "AAPG Bulletin",
    abstract = "ABSTRACT Sequence stratigraphic concepts suggest that stratal geometries develop and are largely controlled by changes in relative sea level. On the shelf, lowstand deposits, which form during falls and subsequent stillstands of relative sea level, can be recognized by the presence of an unconformity at the base, the isolated and basinward position relative to the previous shoreline, and the abrupt seaward translation of shallow-water and shoreline facies into the basin across an unconformity surface. This seaward translation of facies and shoreline regression in response to relative sea level lowering is termed a “forced regression.” A forced regression is independent of variations of sediment flux and is in contrast with “normal” regressions that occur in response to excess sediment flux relative to space available on the shelf (i.e., accommodation). Forced regressions commonly are associated with a zone of sedimentary bypass, subaerial exposure, and possible fluvial erosion between the newly formed and preceding shorelines. Certain shelf sands, previously interpreted as offshore or mid-shelf sand bodies, thus can be reinterpreted as stranded lowstand shorelines associated with forced regressions. This alternative interpretation has economic significance insofar as it suggests different subsurface correlations and reservoir geometries with the potential for development of new play types and enhanced recovery in older fields. Examples of forced regression can be observed at a variety of scales and ages. Several such examples include the modern East Coulee fan delta and the Lower Cretaceous Viking Formation in Alberta, Canada, the Quaternary Rhône Delta, and the Quaternary Hudson Valley system.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1306/bdff8aa6-1718-11d7-8645000102c1865d",
    doi = "10.1306/bdff8aa6-1718-11d7-8645000102c1865d",
    openalex = "W1954552530",
    references = "doi101306m26490c5, doi101306mth7510, doi102110pec88010109, doi1023073514634"
}

I Types of Sedimentary Basins.- 1 Basin Classification and Depositional Environments.- II Depositional Systems and Facies Models.- 2 Continental Sediments.- 3 Coastal and Shallow Sea Sediments (Including Carbonates).- 4 Sediments of Adjacent Seas and Estuaries.- 5 Oceanic Sediments.- 6 Special Depositional Environments and Sediments.- 7 Sequences, Minor Cycles, and Event Stratigraphy.- III Subsidence, Flux Rates, and Sediment Budget.- 8 Subsidence.- 9 Denudation: Solute Transport and Flux Rates of Terrigenous Sediment.- 10 Sedimentation Rates and Organic Matter in Various Depositional Environments.- 11 The Interplay Between Sediment Supply, Subsidence, and Basin Fill.- IV Basin Evolution.- 12 Basin Evolution and Sediments.- V Diagenesis and Fluid Flow.- 13 Mechanical and Chemical Diagenesis.- 14 Hydrocarbons and Coal.- References.

@article{doi105860choice301532,
    author = "Einsele, Gerhard",
    title = "Sedimentary basins: evolution, facies, and sediment budget",
    year = "1992",
    journal = "Choice Reviews Online",
    abstract = "I Types of Sedimentary Basins.- 1 Basin Classification and Depositional Environments.- II Depositional Systems and Facies Models.- 2 Continental Sediments.- 3 Coastal and Shallow Sea Sediments (Including Carbonates).- 4 Sediments of Adjacent Seas and Estuaries.- 5 Oceanic Sediments.- 6 Special Depositional Environments and Sediments.- 7 Sequences, Minor Cycles, and Event Stratigraphy.- III Subsidence, Flux Rates, and Sediment Budget.- 8 Subsidence.- 9 Denudation: Solute Transport and Flux Rates of Terrigenous Sediment.- 10 Sedimentation Rates and Organic Matter in Various Depositional Environments.- 11 The Interplay Between Sediment Supply, Subsidence, and Basin Fill.- IV Basin Evolution.- 12 Basin Evolution and Sediments.- V Diagenesis and Fluid Flow.- 13 Mechanical and Chemical Diagenesis.- 14 Hydrocarbons and Coal.- References.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.5860/choice.30-1532",
    doi = "10.5860/choice.30-1532",
    openalex = "W1581594313"
}

In several increasingly realistic steps, a model of the stratigraphic distribution of fossils is presented. The first and simplest step assumes that if a taxon was extant it will have been preserved. The second step admits that if a taxon was extant, there is some probability less than one that it will have been preserved. This step produces randomly distributed gaps, and fossil ranges that are somewhat shorter than the span of time in which a taxon actually lived. The third step assumes facies-controlled taxa and parasequence-style cyclicity. This produces randomly and nonrandomly distributed gaps, including the anomalously long gaps recognized in confidence limit studies. The final model incorporates depositional sequences and indicates that first and last occurrences will cluster at sequence boundaries and at flooding surfaces in the transgressive systems tract. Across-shelf gradients in diversity, taphonomy, or eurytopy can control the strength, but not the stratigraphic position of these peaks. Comparison of the model to data from the Upper Ordovician suggests that these modeled features are present in the fossil record. Many previously studied paleobiologic patterns may be, at least in part, an artifact of facies control and sequence architecture. Such patterns include gradual or stepwise mass extinction, punctuated morphologic and taxonomic change, iterative evolution, and the replacement of shallow water faunas by deeper water faunas at biomere boundaries.

@article{doi101017s0094837300013099,
    author = "Holland, Steven M.",
    title = "The stratigraphic distribution of fossils",
    year = "1995",
    journal = "Paleobiology",
    abstract = "In several increasingly realistic steps, a model of the stratigraphic distribution of fossils is presented. The first and simplest step assumes that if a taxon was extant it will have been preserved. The second step admits that if a taxon was extant, there is some probability less than one that it will have been preserved. This step produces randomly distributed gaps, and fossil ranges that are somewhat shorter than the span of time in which a taxon actually lived. The third step assumes facies-controlled taxa and parasequence-style cyclicity. This produces randomly and nonrandomly distributed gaps, including the anomalously long gaps recognized in confidence limit studies. The final model incorporates depositional sequences and indicates that first and last occurrences will cluster at sequence boundaries and at flooding surfaces in the transgressive systems tract. Across-shelf gradients in diversity, taphonomy, or eurytopy can control the strength, but not the stratigraphic position of these peaks. Comparison of the model to data from the Upper Ordovician suggests that these modeled features are present in the fossil record. Many previously studied paleobiologic patterns may be, at least in part, an artifact of facies control and sequence architecture. Such patterns include gradual or stepwise mass extinction, punctuated morphologic and taxonomic change, iterative evolution, and the replacement of shallow water faunas by deeper water faunas at biomere boundaries.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1017/s0094837300013099",
    doi = "10.1017/s0094837300013099",
    openalex = "W1807131829",
    references = "doi1010160037073891901395, doi101017s0022336000062223, doi105860choice266278"
}

Pelagic cherts of Japan and British Columbia, Canada, recorded a long-term and worldwide deep-sea anoxic (oxygen-depleted) event across the Permo-Triassic (or Paleozoic and Mesozoic) boundary (251 ± 2 million years ago). The symmetry in lithostratigraphy and redox condition of the boundary sections suggest that the superocean Panthalassa became totally stratified for nearly 20 million years across the boundary. The timing of onset, climax, and termination of the oceanic stratification correspond to global biotic events including the end-Guadalupian decline, the end-Permian extinction, and mid-Triassic recovery.

@article{doi101126science2765310235,
    author = "Isozaki, Yukio",
    title = "Permo-Triassic Boundary Superanoxia and Stratified Superocean: Records from Lost Deep Sea",
    year = "1997",
    journal = "Science",
    abstract = "Pelagic cherts of Japan and British Columbia, Canada, recorded a long-term and worldwide deep-sea anoxic (oxygen-depleted) event across the Permo-Triassic (or Paleozoic and Mesozoic) boundary (251 ± 2 million years ago). The symmetry in lithostratigraphy and redox condition of the boundary sections suggest that the superocean Panthalassa became totally stratified for nearly 20 million years across the boundary. The timing of onset, climax, and termination of the oceanic stratification correspond to global biotic events including the end-Guadalupian decline, the end-Permian extinction, and mid-Triassic recovery.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1126/science.276.5310.235",
    doi = "10.1126/science.276.5310.235",
    openalex = "W2079115522",
    references = "doi1010160031018292901825, doi101126science27252651155"
}

ABSTRACT Significant volumes of terrigenous organic matter can be preserved to form coals only when and where the overall increase in accommodation approximately equals the production rate of peat. Accommodation is a function of subsidence and base level. For mires, base level is very specifically the groundwater table. In paralic settings, the groundwater table is strongly controlled by sea level and the precipitation/evaporation ratio. Peat accumulates over a range of rates, but always with a definite maximum rate set by original organic productivity and space available below depositional base level (groundwater table). Below a threshold accommodation rate (nonzero), no continuous peats accumulate, due to falling or low groundwater table, sedimentary bypass, and extensive erosion by fluvial channels. This is typical of upper highstand, lowstand fan, and basal lowstand-wedge systems tracts. Higher accommodation rates provide relatively stable conditions with rising groundwater tables. Mires initiate and thrive, quickly filling local accommodation vertically and expanding laterally, favoring accumulation of laterally continuous coals in paralic zones within both middle lowstand and middle highstand systems tracts. If the accommodation increase balances or slightly exceeds organic productivity, mires accumulate peat vertically, yielding thicker, more isolated coals most likely during of late low-stand early transgressive and late transgressive-early highstand periods. At very large accommodation increases, mires are stressed and eventually inundated by clastics or standing water (as in middle transgressive systems tracts). These relations should be valid for mires in all settings, including alluvial, lake plain, and paralic. The tie to sea level in paralic zones depends on local subsidence, sediment supply, and groundwater regimes. These concepts are also useful for investigating the distribution of seal and reservoir facies in nonmarine settings.

@article{doi1013063b05c3fc172a11d78645000102c1865d,
    author = "Bohacs, Kevin M. and Suter, John R.",
    title = "Sequence Stratigraphic Distribution of Coaly Rocks: Fundamental Controls and Paralic Examples",
    year = "1997",
    journal = "AAPG Bulletin",
    abstract = "ABSTRACT Significant volumes of terrigenous organic matter can be preserved to form coals only when and where the overall increase in accommodation approximately equals the production rate of peat. Accommodation is a function of subsidence and base level. For mires, base level is very specifically the groundwater table. In paralic settings, the groundwater table is strongly controlled by sea level and the precipitation/evaporation ratio. Peat accumulates over a range of rates, but always with a definite maximum rate set by original organic productivity and space available below depositional base level (groundwater table). Below a threshold accommodation rate (nonzero), no continuous peats accumulate, due to falling or low groundwater table, sedimentary bypass, and extensive erosion by fluvial channels. This is typical of upper highstand, lowstand fan, and basal lowstand-wedge systems tracts. Higher accommodation rates provide relatively stable conditions with rising groundwater tables. Mires initiate and thrive, quickly filling local accommodation vertically and expanding laterally, favoring accumulation of laterally continuous coals in paralic zones within both middle lowstand and middle highstand systems tracts. If the accommodation increase balances or slightly exceeds organic productivity, mires accumulate peat vertically, yielding thicker, more isolated coals most likely during of late low-stand early transgressive and late transgressive-early highstand periods. At very large accommodation increases, mires are stressed and eventually inundated by clastics or standing water (as in middle transgressive systems tracts). These relations should be valid for mires in all settings, including alluvial, lake plain, and paralic. The tie to sea level in paralic zones depends on local subsidence, sediment supply, and groundwater regimes. These concepts are also useful for investigating the distribution of seal and reservoir facies in nonmarine settings.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1306/3b05c3fc-172a-11d7-8645000102c1865d",
    doi = "10.1306/3b05c3fc-172a-11d7-8645000102c1865d",
    openalex = "W2103466666",
    references = "doi1010079783642756689, doi1010160037073891901395, doi101086628623, doi101086648221, doi101306bdff9258171811d78645000102c1865d, doi101306d4267a692b2611d78648000102c1865d, doi101306mth7510, doi102110pec88010047, doi103133pp676, fassett1971geology, openalexw2112906818, openalexw296468733"
}

Data from palaeontology and biodiversity suggest that the global biota should produce an average of three new species per year. However, the fossil record shows large variation around this mean. Rates of origination have declined through the Phanerozoic. This appears to have been largely a function of sorting among higher taxa (especially classes), which exhibit characteristic rates of speciation (and extinction) that differ among them by nearly an order of magnitude. Secular decline of origination rates is hardly constant, however; many positive deviations reflect accelerated speciation during rebounds from mass extinctions. There has also been general decline in rates of speciation within major taxa through their histories, although rates have tended to remain higher among members in tropical regions. Finally, pulses of speciation appear sometimes to be associated with climate change, although moderate oscillations of climate do not necessarily promote speciation despite forcing changes in species' geographical ranges.

@article{doi101098rstb19980212,
    author = "Sepkoski, J. John",
    title = "Rates of speciation in the fossil record",
    year = "1998",
    journal = "Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences",
    abstract = "Data from palaeontology and biodiversity suggest that the global biota should produce an average of three new species per year. However, the fossil record shows large variation around this mean. Rates of origination have declined through the Phanerozoic. This appears to have been largely a function of sorting among higher taxa (especially classes), which exhibit characteristic rates of speciation (and extinction) that differ among them by nearly an order of magnitude. Secular decline of origination rates is hardly constant, however; many positive deviations reflect accelerated speciation during rebounds from mass extinctions. There has also been general decline in rates of speciation within major taxa through their histories, although rates have tended to remain higher among members in tropical regions. Finally, pulses of speciation appear sometimes to be associated with climate change, although moderate oscillations of climate do not necessarily promote speciation despite forcing changes in species' geographical ranges.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.1998.0212",
    doi = "10.1098/rstb.1998.0212",
    openalex = "W2146368901",
    references = "doi101007bfb0011143, doi101016s0031018296000855, doi105860choice321548, openalexw658437845"
}

Abstract Until recently, sequence stratigraphic models have attributed systems tracts to periods of relative sea-level rise, highstand and lowstand. Recognition of a discrete phase of deposition during relative sea-level fall has been limited to a few studies, both in clastic and carbonate systems. Our work in siliciclastic ramp settings suggests that deposition during relative sea-level fall produces a distinctive falling stage systems tract (FSST), and that this is the logical counterpart to the transgressive systems tract. The FSST lies above and basinward of the highstand systems tract, and is overlain by the lowstand systems tract. The FSST is characterized by stratal offlap, although this is likely to be difficult or impossible to recognize because of subsequent subaerial or transgressive ravinement erosion. The most practical diagnostic criteria of the FSST is the presence of erosive-based shoreface sandbodies in nearshore areas. The erosion results from wave scouring during relative sea-level fall, and the stratigraphically lowest surface defines the base of the FSST. Further offshore, shoaling-upward successions may be abruptly capped by gutter casts filled with HCS sandstone, reflecting increased wave scour on the shelf during both FSST and LST time. The top of the FSST is defined by a subaerial surface of erosion which corresponds to the sequence boundary. This surface becomes a correlative submarine conformity seaward of the shoreline, where it forms the base of the lowstand systems tract. Differentiation of the FSST and LST may be difficult, but the LST is expected to contain gradationally-based shoreface successions because it was deposited when relative sea level was rising. Internally, the FSST may be an undifferentiated body of sediment or it may be punctuated by internal regressive surfaces of marine erosion and ravinement surfaces which record higher-frequency sea-level falls and rises superimposed on a lower-frequency sea-level fall. The corresponding higher-order sequences are the building blocks of lower-order sequences. The addition of a falling stage systems tract results in a significant reduction in the proportion of strata within a sequence that are assigned to the classical highstand and lowstand systems tracts. Many outcrop and subsurface cross-sections use an overlying ravinement, or maximum flooding surface as datum. Those surfaces might be flat, but they are not horizontal. Both dip seaward at slopes that generally are steeper than the fluvial system responsible for creating the sequence boundary. When a section is restored to such a datum, the falling stage systems tract will appear to record stratigraphic climb, whereas in fact it does not.

@article{doi101144gslsp20001720101,
    author = "Plint, A. Guy and Nummedal, Dag",
    title = "The falling stage systems tract: recognition and importance in sequence stratigraphic analysis",
    year = "2000",
    journal = "Geological Society London Special Publications",
    abstract = "Abstract Until recently, sequence stratigraphic models have attributed systems tracts to periods of relative sea-level rise, highstand and lowstand. Recognition of a discrete phase of deposition during relative sea-level fall has been limited to a few studies, both in clastic and carbonate systems. Our work in siliciclastic ramp settings suggests that deposition during relative sea-level fall produces a distinctive falling stage systems tract (FSST), and that this is the logical counterpart to the transgressive systems tract. The FSST lies above and basinward of the highstand systems tract, and is overlain by the lowstand systems tract. The FSST is characterized by stratal offlap, although this is likely to be difficult or impossible to recognize because of subsequent subaerial or transgressive ravinement erosion. The most practical diagnostic criteria of the FSST is the presence of erosive-based shoreface sandbodies in nearshore areas. The erosion results from wave scouring during relative sea-level fall, and the stratigraphically lowest surface defines the base of the FSST. Further offshore, shoaling-upward successions may be abruptly capped by gutter casts filled with HCS sandstone, reflecting increased wave scour on the shelf during both FSST and LST time. The top of the FSST is defined by a subaerial surface of erosion which corresponds to the sequence boundary. This surface becomes a correlative submarine conformity seaward of the shoreline, where it forms the base of the lowstand systems tract. Differentiation of the FSST and LST may be difficult, but the LST is expected to contain gradationally-based shoreface successions because it was deposited when relative sea level was rising. Internally, the FSST may be an undifferentiated body of sediment or it may be punctuated by internal regressive surfaces of marine erosion and ravinement surfaces which record higher-frequency sea-level falls and rises superimposed on a lower-frequency sea-level fall. The corresponding higher-order sequences are the building blocks of lower-order sequences. The addition of a falling stage systems tract results in a significant reduction in the proportion of strata within a sequence that are assigned to the classical highstand and lowstand systems tracts. Many outcrop and subsurface cross-sections use an overlying ravinement, or maximum flooding surface as datum. Those surfaces might be flat, but they are not horizontal. Both dip seaward at slopes that generally are steeper than the fluvial system responsible for creating the sequence boundary. When a section is restored to such a datum, the falling stage systems tract will appear to record stratigraphic climb, whereas in fact it does not.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1144/gsl.sp.2000.172.01.01",
    doi = "10.1144/gsl.sp.2000.172.01.01",
    openalex = "W2097237010",
    references = "doi101306m26490c5, doi101306mth7510"
}

Patterns of origination, extinction and standing diversity through time have been inferred from tallies of taxa preserved in the fossil record. This approach assumes that sampling of the fossil record is effectively uniform over time. Although recent evidence suggests that our sampling of the available rock record has indeed been very thorough and effective, there is also overwhelming evidence that the rock record available for sampling is itself distorted by major systematic biases. Data on rock outcrop area compiled for post-Palaeozoic sediments from Western Europe at stage level are presented. These show a strongly cyclical pattern corresponding to first- and second-order sequence stratigraphical depositional cycles. Standing diversity increases over time and, at the coarsest scale, is decoupled from surface outcrop area. This increasing trend can therefore be considered a real pattern. Changes in standing diversity and origination rates over time-scales measured in tens of millions of years, however, are strongly correlated with surface outcrop area. Extinction peaks conform to a random-walk model, but larger peaks occur at just two positions with respect to second-order stratigraphical sequences, towards the culmination of stacked transgressive system tracts and close to system bases, precisely the positions where taxonomic last occurrences are predicted to cluster under a random distribution model. Many of the taxonomic patterns that have been described from the fossil record conform to a species-area effect. Whether this arises primarily from sampling bias, or from changing surface area of marine shelf seas through time and its effect on biodiversity, remains problematic.

@article{doi101098rstb20000768,
    author = "Smith, Andrew B.",
    title = "Large–scale heterogeneity of the fossil record: implications for Phanerozoic biodiversity studies",
    year = "2001",
    journal = "Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences",
    abstract = "Patterns of origination, extinction and standing diversity through time have been inferred from tallies of taxa preserved in the fossil record. This approach assumes that sampling of the fossil record is effectively uniform over time. Although recent evidence suggests that our sampling of the available rock record has indeed been very thorough and effective, there is also overwhelming evidence that the rock record available for sampling is itself distorted by major systematic biases. Data on rock outcrop area compiled for post-Palaeozoic sediments from Western Europe at stage level are presented. These show a strongly cyclical pattern corresponding to first- and second-order sequence stratigraphical depositional cycles. Standing diversity increases over time and, at the coarsest scale, is decoupled from surface outcrop area. This increasing trend can therefore be considered a real pattern. Changes in standing diversity and origination rates over time-scales measured in tens of millions of years, however, are strongly correlated with surface outcrop area. Extinction peaks conform to a random-walk model, but larger peaks occur at just two positions with respect to second-order stratigraphical sequences, towards the culmination of stacked transgressive system tracts and close to system bases, precisely the positions where taxonomic last occurrences are predicted to cluster under a random distribution model. Many of the taxonomic patterns that have been described from the fossil record conform to a species-area effect. Whether this arises primarily from sampling bias, or from changing surface area of marine shelf seas through time and its effect on biodiversity, remains problematic.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2000.0768",
    doi = "10.1098/rstb.2000.0768",
    openalex = "W1978097234",
    references = "doi10100797814615695961, doi101017s0094837300004930, doi10103818872, doi102110pec98020003, doi1023073515097"
}

The association between mass extinction in the marine realm and eustatic sea-level change in the Mesozoic is well documented, but perplexing, because it seems implausible that sea-level change could actually cause a major extinction. However, large-scale cycles of sea-level change can and do alter the ratio of shallow to deep marine continental-shelf deposits preserved in the rock record both regionally and globally. This taphonomic megabias alone could be driving patterns of first and last occurrence and standing diversity because diversity and preservation potential both change predictably with water depth. We show that the Cenomanian/Turonian faunal event in western Europe has all the predicted signatures expected if taphonomic megabias was the cause. Grade taxa terminating in pseudoextinction and Lazarus taxa are predominantly found in the onshore facies that disappear for extended periods from the rock record. Before other mass extinctions are taken at face value, a much more careful analysis of biases in the rock record needs to be carried out, and faunal disappearances need to be analyzed within a phylogenetic framework.

@article{doi1016660094837320010270241slcarr20co2,
    author = "Smith, Andrew B. and Gale, Andrew S. and Monks, Neale",
    title = "Sea-level change and rock-record bias in the Cretaceous: a problem for extinction and biodiversity studies",
    year = "2001",
    journal = "Paleobiology",
    abstract = "The association between mass extinction in the marine realm and eustatic sea-level change in the Mesozoic is well documented, but perplexing, because it seems implausible that sea-level change could actually cause a major extinction. However, large-scale cycles of sea-level change can and do alter the ratio of shallow to deep marine continental-shelf deposits preserved in the rock record both regionally and globally. This taphonomic megabias alone could be driving patterns of first and last occurrence and standing diversity because diversity and preservation potential both change predictably with water depth. We show that the Cenomanian/Turonian faunal event in western Europe has all the predicted signatures expected if taphonomic megabias was the cause. Grade taxa terminating in pseudoextinction and Lazarus taxa are predominantly found in the onshore facies that disappear for extended periods from the rock record. Before other mass extinctions are taken at face value, a much more careful analysis of biases in the rock record needs to be carried out, and faunal disappearances need to be analyzed within a phylogenetic framework.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1666/0094-8373(2001)027<0241:slcarr>2.0.co;2",
    doi = "10.1666/0094-8373(2001)027<0241:slcarr>2.0.co;2",
    openalex = "W2180539419",
    references = "doi1023073515097"
}

▪ Abstract Advances in taphonomy and stratigraphy over the past two decades have dramatically improved our understanding of the causes, effects, and remedies of incompleteness in the fossil record for the study of evolution. Taphonomic research has focused on quantifying probabilities of preservation across taxonomic groups, the temporal and spatial resolution of fossil deposits, and secular changes in preservation over the course of the Phanerozoic. Stratigraphic research has elucidated systematic trends in the formation of sedimentary gaps and permanent stratigraphic records, the quantitative consequences of environmental change and variable rock accumulation rates over short and long timescales, and has benefited from greatly improved methods of correlation and absolute age determination. We provide examples of how these advances are transforming paleontologic investigations of the tempo and mode of morphologic change, phylogenetic analysis, and the environmental and temporal analysis of macroevolutionary patterns.

@article{doi101146annurevecolsys33030602152151,
    author = "Kidwell, Susan M. and Holland, Steven M.",
    title = "The Quality of the Fossil Record: Implications for Evolutionary Analyses",
    year = "2002",
    journal = "Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics",
    abstract = "▪ Abstract Advances in taphonomy and stratigraphy over the past two decades have dramatically improved our understanding of the causes, effects, and remedies of incompleteness in the fossil record for the study of evolution. Taphonomic research has focused on quantifying probabilities of preservation across taxonomic groups, the temporal and spatial resolution of fossil deposits, and secular changes in preservation over the course of the Phanerozoic. Stratigraphic research has elucidated systematic trends in the formation of sedimentary gaps and permanent stratigraphic records, the quantitative consequences of environmental change and variable rock accumulation rates over short and long timescales, and has benefited from greatly improved methods of correlation and absolute age determination. We provide examples of how these advances are transforming paleontologic investigations of the tempo and mode of morphologic change, phylogenetic analysis, and the environmental and temporal analysis of macroevolutionary patterns.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.ecolsys.33.030602.152151",
    doi = "10.1146/annurev.ecolsys.33.030602.152151",
    openalex = "W2101107494",
    references = "doi1010079781489950345, doi101017s0094837300005996, doi101017s0094837300008186, doi101017s0094837300016791, doi101017s0094837300026907, doi101017s2475263000001021, doi10103831927, doi101086628623, doi101126science1061457, doi101126science1067179, doi101126science21545391501, doi101126science28954821139b, doi101146annurevearth281419, doi10166600948373200026103tap20co2, doi102110pec95040129, doi1023073515097, doi1023073515233, doi105860choice300309, doi105860choice333929, schopf1978fossilization"
}

Abstract Linking siliciclastic diagenesis to sequence stratigraphy allows a better understanding of the parameters controlling the spatial and temporal distribution of diagenetic alterations, and hence of reservoir quality. A study of the coal‐bearing, alluvial, deltaic, estuarine and shallow‐marine sandstones of the Rio Bonito Formation, early Permian, Paraná Basin (southern Brazil), reveals that the distribution of diagenetic alterations and of related reservoir quality evolution can be constrained within a sequence stratigraphic framework. Calcite, dolomite, siderite, kaolinite and pyrite cementation is consistently linked to sequence and parasequence boundaries, transgressive and maximum flooding surfaces and is systematically distributed within lowstand, transgressive and highstand systems tracts. Diagenesis of coal layers at parasequence boundaries has promoted the formation of stratabound calcite (detectable in resistivity wire line logs), concretionary pyrite and kaolinite and of silicate grain dissolution in sandstones located above and below these boundaries, particularly in the transgressive systems tract. Meteoric water diagenesis caused grain dissolution and the formation of kaolinite in sandstones below sequence boundaries and in lowstand systems tract sandstones. Carbonate bioclasts and low sedimentation rates in lag deposits at parasequence boundaries, transgressive and maximum flooding surfaces favoured the formation of grain‐rimming siderite. The results of this study are relevant to the exploration of coal‐bed methane and other coal‐bearing reservoirs, where it is crucial to unravel and predict the distribution and quality of reservoirs and compartments.

@article{doi101046j13653091200300586x,
    author = "Ketzer, Marcelo and Holz, Michael and Morad, S. and Al‐Aasm, Ihsan S.",
    title = "Sequence stratigraphic distribution of diagenetic alterations in coal‐bearing, paralic sandstones: evidence from the Rio Bonito Formation (early Permian), southern Brazil",
    year = "2003",
    journal = "Sedimentology",
    abstract = "Abstract Linking siliciclastic diagenesis to sequence stratigraphy allows a better understanding of the parameters controlling the spatial and temporal distribution of diagenetic alterations, and hence of reservoir quality. A study of the coal‐bearing, alluvial, deltaic, estuarine and shallow‐marine sandstones of the Rio Bonito Formation, early Permian, Paraná Basin (southern Brazil), reveals that the distribution of diagenetic alterations and of related reservoir quality evolution can be constrained within a sequence stratigraphic framework. Calcite, dolomite, siderite, kaolinite and pyrite cementation is consistently linked to sequence and parasequence boundaries, transgressive and maximum flooding surfaces and is systematically distributed within lowstand, transgressive and highstand systems tracts. Diagenesis of coal layers at parasequence boundaries has promoted the formation of stratabound calcite (detectable in resistivity wire line logs), concretionary pyrite and kaolinite and of silicate grain dissolution in sandstones located above and below these boundaries, particularly in the transgressive systems tract. Meteoric water diagenesis caused grain dissolution and the formation of kaolinite in sandstones below sequence boundaries and in lowstand systems tract sandstones. Carbonate bioclasts and low sedimentation rates in lag deposits at parasequence boundaries, transgressive and maximum flooding surfaces favoured the formation of grain‐rimming siderite. The results of this study are relevant to the exploration of coal‐bed methane and other coal‐bearing reservoirs, where it is crucial to unravel and predict the distribution and quality of reservoirs and compartments.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1365-3091.2003.00586.x",
    doi = "10.1046/j.1365-3091.2003.00586.x",
    openalex = "W1714644684",
    references = "doi101016s0166516201000568, doi1013062dc409160e4711d78643000102c1865d"
}

A composite Tethyan Late Jurassic–Early Cretaceous carbon and oxygen isotope curve is presented. C-isotope data provide information on the evolution and perturbation of the global carbon cycle. O-isotope data are used as a palaeotemperature proxy in combination with palaeontological information. The resulting trends in climate and in palaeoceanography are compared with biocalcification trends and oceanographic conditions favouring or inhibiting biocalcification. Positive C-isotope anomalies in the Valanginian and Aptian correlate with episodes of increased volcanic activity regarded as a source of excess atmospheric carbon dioxide. A major warming pulse accompanies the Aptian but not the Valanginian C-isotope event. The observed change in Early Aptian temperatures could have triggered the destabilization of sedimentary gas hydrates and the sudden release of methane to the biosphere as recorded as a distinct negative carbon isotope pulse preceding the positive excursion. Both C-isotope anomalies are accompanied by biocalcification crises that may have been triggered by p CO 2 -induced changes in climate and in surface water chemistry. Elevated nutrient levels in river-influenced coastal waters and in upwelling regions further weakened marine calcification. These conditions contrast with ‘normal’ trophic conditions prevailing in the latest Jurassic and favouring biocalcification. The C- and O-isotope curves record a stable mode of carbon cycling and stable temperatures. We conclude that biocalcification is mostly triggered (and inhibited) by CO 2 conditions in the atmosphere–ocean system.

@article{doi1011440016764903087,
    author = "Weissert, Helmut and Erba, Elisabetta",
    title = "Volcanism, CO 2 and palaeoclimate: a Late Jurassic–Early Cretaceous carbon and oxygen isotope record",
    year = "2004",
    journal = "Journal of the Geological Society",
    abstract = "A composite Tethyan Late Jurassic–Early Cretaceous carbon and oxygen isotope curve is presented. C-isotope data provide information on the evolution and perturbation of the global carbon cycle. O-isotope data are used as a palaeotemperature proxy in combination with palaeontological information. The resulting trends in climate and in palaeoceanography are compared with biocalcification trends and oceanographic conditions favouring or inhibiting biocalcification. Positive C-isotope anomalies in the Valanginian and Aptian correlate with episodes of increased volcanic activity regarded as a source of excess atmospheric carbon dioxide. A major warming pulse accompanies the Aptian but not the Valanginian C-isotope event. The observed change in Early Aptian temperatures could have triggered the destabilization of sedimentary gas hydrates and the sudden release of methane to the biosphere as recorded as a distinct negative carbon isotope pulse preceding the positive excursion. Both C-isotope anomalies are accompanied by biocalcification crises that may have been triggered by p CO 2 -induced changes in climate and in surface water chemistry. Elevated nutrient levels in river-influenced coastal waters and in upwelling regions further weakened marine calcification. These conditions contrast with ‘normal’ trophic conditions prevailing in the latest Jurassic and favouring biocalcification. The C- and O-isotope curves record a stable mode of carbon cycling and stable temperatures. We conclude that biocalcification is mostly triggered (and inhibited) by CO 2 conditions in the atmosphere–ocean system.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1144/0016-764903-087",
    doi = "10.1144/0016-764903-087",
    openalex = "W1985005684",
    references = "doi1010160031018284900944"
}

▪ Abstract Studies of plant and animal assemblages from both the terrestrial and the marine fossil records reveal persistence for extensive periods of geological time, sometimes millions of years. Persistence does not require lack of change or the absence of variation from one occurrence of the assemblage to the next in geological time. It does, however, imply that assemblage composition is bounded and that variation occurs within those bounds. The principal cause for these patterns appears to be species-, and perhaps clade-level, environmental fidelity that results in long-term tracking of physical conditions. Other factors that influence persistent recurrence of assemblages are historical, biogeographic effects, the “law of large numbers,” niche differentiation, and biotic interactions. Much research needs to be done in this area, and greater uniformity is needed in the approaches to studying the problem. However, great potential also exists for enhanced interaction between paleoecology and neoecology in understanding spatiotemporal complexity of ecological dynamics.

@article{doi101146annurevecolsys35120202110110,
    author = "DiMichele, William A. and Behrensmeyer, Anna K. and Olszewski, Thomas D. and Labandeira, Conrad C. and Pandolfi, John M. and Wing, Scott L. and Bobe, René",
    title = "Long-Term Stasis in Ecological Assemblages: Evidence from the Fossil Record",
    year = "2004",
    journal = "Annual Review of Ecology Evolution and Systematics",
    abstract = "▪ Abstract Studies of plant and animal assemblages from both the terrestrial and the marine fossil records reveal persistence for extensive periods of geological time, sometimes millions of years. Persistence does not require lack of change or the absence of variation from one occurrence of the assemblage to the next in geological time. It does, however, imply that assemblage composition is bounded and that variation occurs within those bounds. The principal cause for these patterns appears to be species-, and perhaps clade-level, environmental fidelity that results in long-term tracking of physical conditions. Other factors that influence persistent recurrence of assemblages are historical, biogeographic effects, the “law of large numbers,” niche differentiation, and biotic interactions. Much research needs to be done in this area, and greater uniformity is needed in the approaches to studying the problem. However, great potential also exists for enhanced interaction between paleoecology and neoecology in understanding spatiotemporal complexity of ecological dynamics.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.ecolsys.35.120202.110110",
    doi = "10.1146/annurev.ecolsys.35.120202.110110",
    openalex = "W2158758725",
    references = "doi101016s0031018296000260, doi101016s0031018296000855, doi101017s0094837300016894"
}

Quantitative Seismic Interpretation demonstrates how rock physics can be applied to predict reservoir parameters, such as lithologies and pore fluids, from seismically derived attributes. The authors provide an integrated methodology and practical tools for quantitative interpretation, uncertainty assessment, and characterization of subsurface reservoirs using well-log and seismic data. They illustrate the advantages of these new methodologies, while providing advice about limitations of the methods and traditional pitfalls. This book is aimed at graduate students, academics and industry professionals working in the areas of petroleum geoscience and exploration seismology. It will also interest environmental geophysicists seeking a quantitative subsurface characterization from shallow seismic data. The book includes problem sets and a case-study, for which seismic and well-log data, and Matlab codes are provided on a website (http://www.cambridge.org/9780521816014). These resources will allow readers to gain a hands-on understanding of the methodologies

@book{doi101017cbo9780511600074,
    author = "Avseth, Per and Mukerji, Tapan and Mavko, Gary",
    title = "Quantitative seismic interpretation applying rock physics tools to reduce interpretation risk",
    year = "2005",
    abstract = "Quantitative Seismic Interpretation demonstrates how rock physics can be applied to predict reservoir parameters, such as lithologies and pore fluids, from seismically derived attributes. The authors provide an integrated methodology and practical tools for quantitative interpretation, uncertainty assessment, and characterization of subsurface reservoirs using well-log and seismic data. They illustrate the advantages of these new methodologies, while providing advice about limitations of the methods and traditional pitfalls. This book is aimed at graduate students, academics and industry professionals working in the areas of petroleum geoscience and exploration seismology. It will also interest environmental geophysicists seeking a quantitative subsurface characterization from shallow seismic data. The book includes problem sets and a case-study, for which seismic and well-log data, and Matlab codes are provided on a website (http://www.cambridge.org/9780521816014). These resources will allow readers to gain a hands-on understanding of the methodologies",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1017/cbo9780511600074",
    doi = "10.1017/cbo9780511600074",
    openalex = "W1546028642",
    references = "doi10119011440450, doi10119011444059, doi1013062f9182e316ce11d78645000102c1865d, doi101306a25fe3bf171b11d78645000102c1865d, doi101306m26490c5"
}

We present a 5.3‐Myr stack (the “LR04” stack) of benthic δ 18 O records from 57 globally distributed sites aligned by an automated graphic correlation algorithm. This is the first benthic δ 18 O stack composed of more than three records to extend beyond 850 ka, and we use its improved signal quality to identify 24 new marine isotope stages in the early Pliocene. We also present a new LR04 age model for the Pliocene‐Pleistocene derived from tuning the δ 18 O stack to a simple ice model based on 21 June insolation at 65°N. Stacked sedimentation rates provide additional age model constraints to prevent overtuning. Despite a conservative tuning strategy, the LR04 benthic stack exhibits significant coherency with insolation in the obliquity band throughout the entire 5.3 Myr and in the precession band for more than half of the record. The LR04 stack contains significantly more variance in benthic δ 18 O than previously published stacks of the late Pleistocene as the result of higher‐resolution records, a better alignment technique, and a greater percentage of records from the Atlantic. Finally, the relative phases of the stack's 41‐ and 23‐kyr components suggest that the precession component of δ 18 O from 2.7–1.6 Ma is primarily a deep‐water temperature signal and that the phase of δ 18 O precession response changed suddenly at 1.6 Ma.

@article{doi1010292004pa001071,
    author = "Lisiecki, L. E. and Raymo, Maureen E.",
    title = "A Pliocene‐Pleistocene stack of 57 globally distributed benthic δ 18 O records",
    year = "2005",
    journal = "Paleoceanography",
    abstract = "We present a 5.3‐Myr stack (the “LR04” stack) of benthic δ 18 O records from 57 globally distributed sites aligned by an automated graphic correlation algorithm. This is the first benthic δ 18 O stack composed of more than three records to extend beyond 850 ka, and we use its improved signal quality to identify 24 new marine isotope stages in the early Pliocene. We also present a new LR04 age model for the Pliocene‐Pleistocene derived from tuning the δ 18 O stack to a simple ice model based on 21 June insolation at 65°N. Stacked sedimentation rates provide additional age model constraints to prevent overtuning. Despite a conservative tuning strategy, the LR04 benthic stack exhibits significant coherency with insolation in the obliquity band throughout the entire 5.3 Myr and in the precession band for more than half of the record. The LR04 stack contains significantly more variance in benthic δ 18 O than previously published stacks of the late Pleistocene as the result of higher‐resolution records, a better alignment technique, and a greater percentage of records from the Atlantic. Finally, the relative phases of the stack's 41‐ and 23‐kyr components suggest that the precession component of δ 18 O from 2.7–1.6 Ma is primarily a deep‐water temperature signal and that the phase of δ 18 O precession response changed suddenly at 1.6 Ma.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1029/2004pa001071",
    doi = "10.1029/2004pa001071",
    openalex = "W1631559605",
    references = "doi1010160012821x94902445, doi101016027737919190033q, doi101017s0263593300020782, doi10102992pa02253, doi10102994jb03098, doi10102997pa01019, doi101038359311a0, doi101038364218a0, doi101038366552a0, doi101038nature02599, doi101126science2074434943"
}

We review Phanerozoic sea-level changes [543 million years ago (Ma) to the present] on various time scales and present a new sea-level record for the past 100 million years (My). Long-term sea level peaked at 100 +/- 50 meters during the Cretaceous, implying that ocean-crust production rates were much lower than previously inferred. Sea level mirrors oxygen isotope variations, reflecting ice-volume change on the 10(4)- to 10(6)-year scale, but a link between oxygen isotope and sea level on the 10(7)-year scale must be due to temperature changes that we attribute to tectonically controlled carbon dioxide variations. Sea-level change has influenced phytoplankton evolution, ocean chemistry, and the loci of carbonate, organic carbon, and siliciclastic sediment burial. Over the past 100 My, sea-level changes reflect global climate evolution from a time of ephemeral Antarctic ice sheets (100 to 33 Ma), through a time of large ice sheets primarily in Antarctica (33 to 2.5 Ma), to a world with large Antarctic and large, variable Northern Hemisphere ice sheets (2.5 Ma to the present).

@article{doi101126science1116412,
    author = "Miller, Kenneth G. and Kominz, Michelle A. and Browning, James V. and Wright, James D. and Mountain, Gregory S. and Katz, Miriam and Sugarman, Peter J. and Cramer, Benjamin S. and Christie‐Blick, Nicholas and Pekar, Stephen F.",
    title = "The Phanerozoic Record of Global Sea-Level Change",
    year = "2005",
    journal = "Science",
    abstract = "We review Phanerozoic sea-level changes [543 million years ago (Ma) to the present] on various time scales and present a new sea-level record for the past 100 million years (My). Long-term sea level peaked at 100 +/- 50 meters during the Cretaceous, implying that ocean-crust production rates were much lower than previously inferred. Sea level mirrors oxygen isotope variations, reflecting ice-volume change on the 10(4)- to 10(6)-year scale, but a link between oxygen isotope and sea level on the 10(7)-year scale must be due to temperature changes that we attribute to tectonically controlled carbon dioxide variations. Sea-level change has influenced phytoplankton evolution, ocean chemistry, and the loci of carbonate, organic carbon, and siliciclastic sediment burial. Over the past 100 My, sea-level changes reflect global climate evolution from a time of ephemeral Antarctic ice sheets (100 to 33 Ma), through a time of large ice sheets primarily in Antarctica (33 to 2.5 Ma), to a world with large Antarctic and large, variable Northern Hemisphere ice sheets (2.5 Ma to the present).",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1116412",
    doi = "10.1126/science.1116412",
    openalex = "W2153985161",
    references = "doi1010160012821x96000623, doi101017cbo9780511628948, doi10102990jb02015, doi10102992jb01202, doi10102994jb01889, doi10102998rg01624, doi101029pa002i001p00001, doi101038297391a0, doi101038339532a0, doi1010510004636120041335, doi101126science1059412, doi101126science19442701121, doi101126science23547931156, doi1011300016760619637493sitcio20co2, doi1023073515270, doi102475ajs294156, doi102475ajs3012182, donovan1979causes"
}

We present a δ 13 C record from the Anti-Atlas mountains of Morocco and place it in the context of a detailed regional tectonostratigraphy. We place the litho- and chemostratigraphic record in a temporal framework using precision U–Pb zircon geochronology of ashes interbedded with the same carbonate units that provide δ 13 C data. The variations in δ 13 C of carbonate occur on a wide range of time scales, suggesting that different mechanisms are involved, including non-steady state release of isotopically depleted carbon reservoirs on short (<100 000 years) time scales and changes in nutrient recycling and organic carbon burial on longer (≥1 Ma) time scales. Through a correlation with more fossiliferous, albeit condensed, sections in Siberia, we examine the pattern of cyclic δ 13 C variation in the context of the reappearance and diversification of skeletonized metazoa during the Early Cambrian.

@article{doi101139e05062,
    author = "Maloof, Adam C. and Schrag, Daniel P. and Crowley, James L. and Bowring, Samuel A.",
    title = "An expanded record of Early Cambrian carbon cycling from the Anti-Atlas Margin, Morocco",
    year = "2005",
    journal = "Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences",
    abstract = "We present a δ 13 C record from the Anti-Atlas mountains of Morocco and place it in the context of a detailed regional tectonostratigraphy. We place the litho- and chemostratigraphic record in a temporal framework using precision U–Pb zircon geochronology of ashes interbedded with the same carbonate units that provide δ 13 C data. The variations in δ 13 C of carbonate occur on a wide range of time scales, suggesting that different mechanisms are involved, including non-steady state release of isotopically depleted carbon reservoirs on short (<100 000 years) time scales and changes in nutrient recycling and organic carbon burial on longer (≥1 Ma) time scales. Through a correlation with more fossiliferous, albeit condensed, sections in Siberia, we examine the pattern of cyclic δ 13 C variation in the context of the reappearance and diversification of skeletonized metazoa during the Early Cambrian.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1139/e05-062",
    doi = "10.1139/e05-062",
    openalex = "W2141398750",
    references = "doi1010160016703773902135, doi101016001670378290165x, doi101016030442039500008f, doi101016jpalwor200610016, doi101016s0009254199000819, doi10102995pa02087, doi10103822941, doi101086628978, doi101103physrevc41889, doi10113000917613200028299ptdvus20co2, doi101139p66090, doi102475ajs2837641, openalexw1552913007"
}

Mass extinctions can play a role in shaping macroevolutionary trends through time, but the contribution of recoveries to this process has yet to be examined in detail. This study focuses on the effects of three extinction events, the end-Cretaceous (K/T), mid-Eocene (mid-E), and end-Eocene (E/O), on long-term patterns of body size in veneroid bivalves. Systematic data were collected for 719 species and 140 subgenera of veneroids from the Late Cretaceous through Oligocene of North America and Europe. Centroid size measures were calculated for 101 subgenera and global stratigraphic ranges were used to assess extinction selectivity and preferential recovery. Veneroids underwent a substantial extinction at the K/T boundary, although diversity recovered to pre-extinction levels by the early Eocene. The mid-E and E/O events were considerably smaller and their recovery intervals much shorter. None of these events were characterized by significant extinction selectivity according to body size at the subgenus level; however, all three recoveries were strongly size biased. The K/T recovery was biased toward smaller veneroids, whereas both the mid-E and E/O recoveries were biased toward larger ones. The decrease in veneroid size across the K/T recovery actually reinforced a Late Cretaceous trend toward smaller sizes, whereas the increase in size resulting from the Eocene recoveries was relatively short-lived. Early Cenozoic changes in predation, temperature, and/or productivity may explain these shifts.

@article{doi1016660094837320050310578bseeat20co2,
    author = "Lockwood, Rowan",
    title = "Body size, extinction events, and the early Cenozoic record of veneroid bivalves: a new role for recoveries?",
    year = "2005",
    journal = "Paleobiology",
    abstract = "Mass extinctions can play a role in shaping macroevolutionary trends through time, but the contribution of recoveries to this process has yet to be examined in detail. This study focuses on the effects of three extinction events, the end-Cretaceous (K/T), mid-Eocene (mid-E), and end-Eocene (E/O), on long-term patterns of body size in veneroid bivalves. Systematic data were collected for 719 species and 140 subgenera of veneroids from the Late Cretaceous through Oligocene of North America and Europe. Centroid size measures were calculated for 101 subgenera and global stratigraphic ranges were used to assess extinction selectivity and preferential recovery. Veneroids underwent a substantial extinction at the K/T boundary, although diversity recovered to pre-extinction levels by the early Eocene. The mid-E and E/O events were considerably smaller and their recovery intervals much shorter. None of these events were characterized by significant extinction selectivity according to body size at the subgenus level; however, all three recoveries were strongly size biased. The K/T recovery was biased toward smaller veneroids, whereas both the mid-E and E/O recoveries were biased toward larger ones. The decrease in veneroid size across the K/T recovery actually reinforced a Late Cretaceous trend toward smaller sizes, whereas the increase in size resulting from the Eocene recoveries was relatively short-lived. Early Cenozoic changes in predation, temperature, and/or productivity may explain these shifts.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1666/0094-8373(2005)031[0578:bseeat]2.0.co;2",
    doi = "10.1666/0094-8373(2005)031[0578:bseeat]2.0.co;2",
    openalex = "W2134145562",
    references = "doi101016s0031018299000887, doi101017s0094837300011787"
}

ABSTRACT To better constrain the spatial and stratigraphic distribution of the depositional facies, a synthesis of outcrop and subsurface data for the depositional system of the Upper Dalan Member and Kangan Formation in the Zagros to the offshore Fars area was carried out. The areas that were studied in detail are the Kuh-e Surmeh and Kuh-e Dena sections of the Zagros Mountains, Iran, and their equivalent in the offshore Fars subsurface. The observations and interpretations based on these sections were then integrated with the regional subsurface descriptions, interpretations and models, and related to the Upper Khuff system across the region. The synthesis of the core descriptions and the Zagros outcrop facies data, together with integration of published data resulted in the definition and characterisation of 16 principal facies associations that were used to interpret the depositional environment. Qualitative comparisons of Upper Khuff sections and subsurface cores across the Zagros area, offshore Fars and Middle East Gulf region, showed that this classification of depositional facies is applicable at a larger regional scale and useful in rapid regional comparisons and correlations of the Upper Khuff depositional systems. The large range in documented facies types reflects the great variety in depositional systems and sub-systems that were present across the Khuff platform. The range also shows the temporal evolution of the Khuff environments and palaeoecological conditions from the Permian to the Triassic. The general importance of microbial facies is highlighted and a variety of microbial facies are defined. These microbial events provide reservoir and regional scale isochronous marker horizons that are correlatable over large distances. These microbial facies are associated with periods of poor oxygenation and restriction, but nevertheless can occupy a range of environments from intertidal to mid-to outer-ramp settings. Several significant stratigraphic surfaces were picked and correlated based on the detailed core descriptions, the bio- and ecostratigraphic analysis, wireline logs, stratigraphic stacking patterns and the regional understanding of other Upper Dalan-Kangan/Upper Khuff sections in the region. The correlations in cored wells for the Upper Dalan cycles are supported by a well-constrained biostratigraphic framework. Four large third-order stacking cycles (Cycle IV to Cycle I) were defined on the basis of cycles bounded by surfaces representing baselevel and accommodation potential minima. The correlations and stratigraphic analysis suggest that the major stratigraphic trends and large-scale stratigraphic architecture are relatively isopachous (“layer-cake”) at the production scales, a function of the almost flat platform geometry. At a larger scale, significant changes in thickness occur: either thickening towards palaeodepocentres or thinning with onlap towards palaeohighs. At this large-scale, progradation of the oolite shoals occurred during the late highstands in the large accommodation areas. However, on the topographic palaeohighs and platform tops, the main stratigraphic locations of the oolite shoal are in the trangressive and maximum accommodation zones of the cycles. Integrating the facies and stratigraphic interpretations, conceptual depositional models have been constructed for the main stratigraphic intervals. From these interpretations and models it is evident that there were significant changes in platform type/geometry, facies organisation and climate from Cycle VI through to Cycle I. At a large scale the Late Permian depositional setting of the Upper Khuff was organised into a platform profile that gently deepened from the south with a platform-top interior zone, a platform-top edge zone, an intrashelf low, and then rose again in the north with palaeohighs around Kuh-e Surmeh and Kuh-e Dena (structurally-controlled basement highs). There was however a major change in the platform profile in the Early Triassic which had a monoclinal ramp platform geometry which opened to the north to deeper-marine conditions with the absence of effective palaeohigh barriers. These two large-scale palaeogeographic profiles controlled the overall distribution of facies belts across the platform. This change in platform profile was coincident with other events within the lowest part of the Kangan Formation (Triassic Khuff Formation of the Arabian Plate) at the Permian-Triassic Boundary, including: (1) major facies changes on the platform tops with the appearance of thrombolites and associated microbial grainstones; (2) major facies changes in the northern shelf edge areas where there is a change from shallow-water high-energy grainy facies to deeper-water mid-ramp muddy facies; (3) change in pattern of relative stratigraphic thickness; and (4) appearance of high gamma-ray shales in the eastern Zagros subsurface area. These events are all consistent with a major flooding across the Permian-Triassic Boundary causing: (1) drowning of palaeohighs; (2) encroachment of anoxic waters into the intrashelf lows; (3) termination of bioaccumulations at the shelf edges; (4) flooding the platform tops with more grainy facies, and developing microbial facies across the shelf; and (5) the quasi-synchronous end-Permian mass extinction. Based on the stratigraphic distributions of the biostratigraphically significant fauna and flora, age determinations are interpreted for the main stratigraphic intervals between the Lower Dalan to top Dalan (Lower Khuff to Permian Upper Khuff). Palaeoecologically, five biofacies types have been defined based on the faunal and algal content, the foraminiferal diversity, their sedimentological context and palaeoenvironmental interpretation. This generalised classification is applied to the depositional models developed from the sedimentological analysis and has enabled a validation of the depositional schemes by identifying palaeoenvironmental trends which are not always clear from the sedimentological analysis alone. The analysis of the biofacies distribution has allowed the subdivision of the Upper Dalan Member (Permian Upper Khuff) into six different ‘palaeoecological systems’ that correspond to characteristic faunal assemblages and biofacies sets. The main characteristics of the six palaeoecological systems, and their lateral variability, have been documented. The limits of the defined intervals correspond to important sequence stratigraphic events and markers at various stratigraphic scales. This relationship allowed the integration of ecostratigraphic events to the previously defined sequence stratigraphical framework based on the sedimentological and stratigraphic analysis, and hence confirms and refines the stratigraphic correlations. A synthesis of stratigraphic, depositional and diagenetic facies, lithological, isotopic, spectral gamma-ray wireline logs and palaeoecological data suggests that there is no major stratigraphic gap between the KS3 and the KS2 stratigraphic intervals, and hence between the Permian and Triassic periods. In the numerous subsurface sections, and outcrop investigations in the Zagros, no evidence for a major unconformity/disconformity or stratigraphic surface is associated with the Permian-Triassic Boundary; furthermore the extinction of Permian fauna occurs within a grainstone body. The faunistic analysis shows that the Permian Fauna Extinction (PFE) event generally occurs within a strongly calcite-cemented and microbially mediated ooid grainstone rich in intraclasts in the lower part of the KS2 sequence. Above the PFE event is a thin Permian azoic interval, followed by the Triassic faunal recovery and associated with the Early Triassic thrombolitic microbial event. In the Zagros area the PFE occurs within pyrite-bearing muds under poorly oxygenated conditions. The outcrop data also show a similar pattern with a thin azoic interval occurring between the last Permian taxa and the first Triassic taxa. In the Zagros outcrops there is a general muddying (deepening-upwards) from the Upper Permian to the Lower Triassic. The analysis suggests there is a low (third) order transgression between upper KS3 stratigraphic interval (Upper Permian) and the KS2 stratigraphic interval (Lower Triassic), and that the ‘Permian-Triassic oceanic event’ is located in the late third-order TST.

@article{doi102113geoarabia110275,
    author = "Insalaco, Enzo and Virgone, Aurélien and Courme, Bruno and Gaillot, Jérémie and Kamali, Mohammad Reza and Moallemi, Ali and Lotfpour, Masoud and Monibi, S.",
    title = "Upper Dalan Member and Kangan Formation between the Zagros Mountains and offshore Fars, Iran: depositional system, biostratigraphy and stratigraphic architecture",
    year = "2006",
    journal = "GeoArabia",
    abstract = "ABSTRACT To better constrain the spatial and stratigraphic distribution of the depositional facies, a synthesis of outcrop and subsurface data for the depositional system of the Upper Dalan Member and Kangan Formation in the Zagros to the offshore Fars area was carried out. The areas that were studied in detail are the Kuh-e Surmeh and Kuh-e Dena sections of the Zagros Mountains, Iran, and their equivalent in the offshore Fars subsurface. The observations and interpretations based on these sections were then integrated with the regional subsurface descriptions, interpretations and models, and related to the Upper Khuff system across the region. The synthesis of the core descriptions and the Zagros outcrop facies data, together with integration of published data resulted in the definition and characterisation of 16 principal facies associations that were used to interpret the depositional environment. Qualitative comparisons of Upper Khuff sections and subsurface cores across the Zagros area, offshore Fars and Middle East Gulf region, showed that this classification of depositional facies is applicable at a larger regional scale and useful in rapid regional comparisons and correlations of the Upper Khuff depositional systems. The large range in documented facies types reflects the great variety in depositional systems and sub-systems that were present across the Khuff platform. The range also shows the temporal evolution of the Khuff environments and palaeoecological conditions from the Permian to the Triassic. The general importance of microbial facies is highlighted and a variety of microbial facies are defined. These microbial events provide reservoir and regional scale isochronous marker horizons that are correlatable over large distances. These microbial facies are associated with periods of poor oxygenation and restriction, but nevertheless can occupy a range of environments from intertidal to mid-to outer-ramp settings. Several significant stratigraphic surfaces were picked and correlated based on the detailed core descriptions, the bio- and ecostratigraphic analysis, wireline logs, stratigraphic stacking patterns and the regional understanding of other Upper Dalan-Kangan/Upper Khuff sections in the region. The correlations in cored wells for the Upper Dalan cycles are supported by a well-constrained biostratigraphic framework. Four large third-order stacking cycles (Cycle IV to Cycle I) were defined on the basis of cycles bounded by surfaces representing baselevel and accommodation potential minima. The correlations and stratigraphic analysis suggest that the major stratigraphic trends and large-scale stratigraphic architecture are relatively isopachous (“layer-cake”) at the production scales, a function of the almost flat platform geometry. At a larger scale, significant changes in thickness occur: either thickening towards palaeodepocentres or thinning with onlap towards palaeohighs. At this large-scale, progradation of the oolite shoals occurred during the late highstands in the large accommodation areas. However, on the topographic palaeohighs and platform tops, the main stratigraphic locations of the oolite shoal are in the trangressive and maximum accommodation zones of the cycles. Integrating the facies and stratigraphic interpretations, conceptual depositional models have been constructed for the main stratigraphic intervals. From these interpretations and models it is evident that there were significant changes in platform type/geometry, facies organisation and climate from Cycle VI through to Cycle I. At a large scale the Late Permian depositional setting of the Upper Khuff was organised into a platform profile that gently deepened from the south with a platform-top interior zone, a platform-top edge zone, an intrashelf low, and then rose again in the north with palaeohighs around Kuh-e Surmeh and Kuh-e Dena (structurally-controlled basement highs). There was however a major change in the platform profile in the Early Triassic which had a monoclinal ramp platform geometry which opened to the north to deeper-marine conditions with the absence of effective palaeohigh barriers. These two large-scale palaeogeographic profiles controlled the overall distribution of facies belts across the platform. This change in platform profile was coincident with other events within the lowest part of the Kangan Formation (Triassic Khuff Formation of the Arabian Plate) at the Permian-Triassic Boundary, including: (1) major facies changes on the platform tops with the appearance of thrombolites and associated microbial grainstones; (2) major facies changes in the northern shelf edge areas where there is a change from shallow-water high-energy grainy facies to deeper-water mid-ramp muddy facies; (3) change in pattern of relative stratigraphic thickness; and (4) appearance of high gamma-ray shales in the eastern Zagros subsurface area. These events are all consistent with a major flooding across the Permian-Triassic Boundary causing: (1) drowning of palaeohighs; (2) encroachment of anoxic waters into the intrashelf lows; (3) termination of bioaccumulations at the shelf edges; (4) flooding the platform tops with more grainy facies, and developing microbial facies across the shelf; and (5) the quasi-synchronous end-Permian mass extinction. Based on the stratigraphic distributions of the biostratigraphically significant fauna and flora, age determinations are interpreted for the main stratigraphic intervals between the Lower Dalan to top Dalan (Lower Khuff to Permian Upper Khuff). Palaeoecologically, five biofacies types have been defined based on the faunal and algal content, the foraminiferal diversity, their sedimentological context and palaeoenvironmental interpretation. This generalised classification is applied to the depositional models developed from the sedimentological analysis and has enabled a validation of the depositional schemes by identifying palaeoenvironmental trends which are not always clear from the sedimentological analysis alone. The analysis of the biofacies distribution has allowed the subdivision of the Upper Dalan Member (Permian Upper Khuff) into six different ‘palaeoecological systems’ that correspond to characteristic faunal assemblages and biofacies sets. The main characteristics of the six palaeoecological systems, and their lateral variability, have been documented. The limits of the defined intervals correspond to important sequence stratigraphic events and markers at various stratigraphic scales. This relationship allowed the integration of ecostratigraphic events to the previously defined sequence stratigraphical framework based on the sedimentological and stratigraphic analysis, and hence confirms and refines the stratigraphic correlations. A synthesis of stratigraphic, depositional and diagenetic facies, lithological, isotopic, spectral gamma-ray wireline logs and palaeoecological data suggests that there is no major stratigraphic gap between the KS3 and the KS2 stratigraphic intervals, and hence between the Permian and Triassic periods. In the numerous subsurface sections, and outcrop investigations in the Zagros, no evidence for a major unconformity/disconformity or stratigraphic surface is associated with the Permian-Triassic Boundary; furthermore the extinction of Permian fauna occurs within a grainstone body. The faunistic analysis shows that the Permian Fauna Extinction (PFE) event generally occurs within a strongly calcite-cemented and microbially mediated ooid grainstone rich in intraclasts in the lower part of the KS2 sequence. Above the PFE event is a thin Permian azoic interval, followed by the Triassic faunal recovery and associated with the Early Triassic thrombolitic microbial event. In the Zagros area the PFE occurs within pyrite-bearing muds under poorly oxygenated conditions. The outcrop data also show a similar pattern with a thin azoic interval occurring between the last Permian taxa and the first Triassic taxa. In the Zagros outcrops there is a general muddying (deepening-upwards) from the Upper Permian to the Lower Triassic. The analysis suggests there is a low (third) order transgression between upper KS3 stratigraphic interval (Upper Permian) and the KS2 stratigraphic interval (Lower Triassic), and that the ‘Permian-Triassic oceanic event’ is located in the late third-order TST.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.2113/geoarabia110275",
    doi = "10.2113/geoarabia110275",
    openalex = "W2910362007",
    references = "doi10108000241160410006483, doi102113geoarabia0603407, doi1023073515097"
}

For much of the Mesozoic record there has been an inconclusive debate on the possible global significance of isotopic proxies for environmental change and of sequence stratigraphic depositional sequences. We present a carbon and oxygen isotope and elemental record for part of the Early Jurassic based on marine benthic and nektobenthic molluscs and brachiopods from the shallow marine succession of the Cleveland Basin, UK. The invertebrate isotope record is supplemented with carbon isotope data from fossil wood, which samples atmospheric carbon. New data elucidate two major global carbon isotope events, a negative excursion of ∼2‰ at the Sinemurian–Pliensbachian boundary, and a positive excursion of ∼2‰ in the Late Pliensbachian. The Sinemurian–Pliensbachian boundary event is similar to the slightly younger Toarcian Oceanic Anoxic Event and is characterized by deposition of relatively deepwater organic‐rich shale. The Late Pliensbachian strata by contrast are characterized by shallow marine deposition. Oxygen isotope data imply cooling locally for both events. However, because deeper water conditions characterize the Sinemurian–Pliensbachian boundary in the Cleveland Basin the temperature drop is likely of local significance; in contrast a cool Late Pliensbachian shallow seafloor agrees with previous inference of partial icehouse conditions. Both the large‐scale, long‐term and small‐scale, short‐duration isotopic cycles occurred in concert with relative sea level changes documented previously from sequence stratigraphy. Isotope events and the sea level cycles are concluded to reflect processes of global significance, supporting the idea of an Early Jurassic in which cyclic swings from icehouse to greenhouse and super greenhouse conditions occurred at timescales from 1 to 10 Ma.

@article{doi1010292011pa002160,
    author = "Korte, Christoph and Hesselbo, Stephen P.",
    title = "Shallow marine carbon and oxygen isotope and elemental records indicate icehouse‐greenhouse cycles during the Early Jurassic",
    year = "2011",
    journal = "Paleoceanography",
    abstract = "For much of the Mesozoic record there has been an inconclusive debate on the possible global significance of isotopic proxies for environmental change and of sequence stratigraphic depositional sequences. We present a carbon and oxygen isotope and elemental record for part of the Early Jurassic based on marine benthic and nektobenthic molluscs and brachiopods from the shallow marine succession of the Cleveland Basin, UK. The invertebrate isotope record is supplemented with carbon isotope data from fossil wood, which samples atmospheric carbon. New data elucidate two major global carbon isotope events, a negative excursion of ∼2‰ at the Sinemurian–Pliensbachian boundary, and a positive excursion of ∼2‰ in the Late Pliensbachian. The Sinemurian–Pliensbachian boundary event is similar to the slightly younger Toarcian Oceanic Anoxic Event and is characterized by deposition of relatively deepwater organic‐rich shale. The Late Pliensbachian strata by contrast are characterized by shallow marine deposition. Oxygen isotope data imply cooling locally for both events. However, because deeper water conditions characterize the Sinemurian–Pliensbachian boundary in the Cleveland Basin the temperature drop is likely of local significance; in contrast a cool Late Pliensbachian shallow seafloor agrees with previous inference of partial icehouse conditions. Both the large‐scale, long‐term and small‐scale, short‐duration isotopic cycles occurred in concert with relative sea level changes documented previously from sequence stratigraphy. Isotope events and the sea level cycles are concluded to reflect processes of global significance, supporting the idea of an Early Jurassic in which cyclic swings from icehouse to greenhouse and super greenhouse conditions occurred at timescales from 1 to 10 Ma.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1029/2011pa002160",
    doi = "10.1029/2011pa002160",
    openalex = "W1628518003",
    references = "doi101016jsedgeo200412016, doi101016s0009254103000329, doi1010292008pa001607, doi101130g315791, doi101144gslsp19910580119, doi1023071796493"
}

Abstract This study focuses on storm deposits in the Muschelkalk facies of the Betic Cordillera (southern Spain) and interprets their deposition mechanisms. Three types of storm deposit are distinguished: (i) pot/gutter casts; (ii) tempestite beds; and (iii) storm‐winnowed deposits. Each deposit provides information about the carbonate platform environment in which it was deposited. The tempestite models proposed are: (i) the bypass‐zone tempestite model, occurring in a muddy ramp at the epicontinental basin margin. This model is characterized by potholes and gutters that form in a shoreline bypass‐zone during storms; (ii) the gradient‐current tempestite model in which frequent tempestite beds are related to storm gradient currents. Thickness and grain size decrease towards the deep distal ramp; and (iii) the winnowed deposit tempestite model whereby storm deposits are winnowed and deposited in the same environment with only short lateral transport having occurred. This model evokes more restricted and shallower conditions, lagoons or inland seas. The distribution of all these deposits in the stratigraphic sections studied corroborate the eustatic third‐order cycle identified, although the different features of the storm deposits and their positions in each section indicate a subsidence varying in time and space. In the transgressive stage, the margins of the epicontinental basin were a well‐developed ramp with potholes and gutters. In contrast, during the high sea‐level stage, storm deposits generated tempestite beds or storm‐winnowed deposits in the different areas. The epicontinental carbonate platform with ramp edges evolved into a complex depositional system of coastal and shallow‐marine environments with lagoons and restricted inland seas. Thus, the epicontinental platform underwent substantial change from the Late Anisian to the Late Ladinian and this is reflected in its storm deposits.

@article{doi101111j13653091201101270x,
    author = "Pérez‐López, Alberto and Pérez‐Valera, Fernando",
    title = "Tempestite facies models for the epicontinental Triassic carbonates of the Betic Cordillera (southern Spain)",
    year = "2011",
    journal = "Sedimentology",
    abstract = "Abstract This study focuses on storm deposits in the Muschelkalk facies of the Betic Cordillera (southern Spain) and interprets their deposition mechanisms. Three types of storm deposit are distinguished: (i) pot/gutter casts; (ii) tempestite beds; and (iii) storm‐winnowed deposits. Each deposit provides information about the carbonate platform environment in which it was deposited. The tempestite models proposed are: (i) the bypass‐zone tempestite model, occurring in a muddy ramp at the epicontinental basin margin. This model is characterized by potholes and gutters that form in a shoreline bypass‐zone during storms; (ii) the gradient‐current tempestite model in which frequent tempestite beds are related to storm gradient currents. Thickness and grain size decrease towards the deep distal ramp; and (iii) the winnowed deposit tempestite model whereby storm deposits are winnowed and deposited in the same environment with only short lateral transport having occurred. This model evokes more restricted and shallower conditions, lagoons or inland seas. The distribution of all these deposits in the stratigraphic sections studied corroborate the eustatic third‐order cycle identified, although the different features of the storm deposits and their positions in each section indicate a subsidence varying in time and space. In the transgressive stage, the margins of the epicontinental basin were a well‐developed ramp with potholes and gutters. In contrast, during the high sea‐level stage, storm deposits generated tempestite beds or storm‐winnowed deposits in the different areas. The epicontinental carbonate platform with ramp edges evolved into a complex depositional system of coastal and shallow‐marine environments with lagoons and restricted inland seas. Thus, the epicontinental platform underwent substantial change from the Late Anisian to the Late Ladinian and this is reflected in its storm deposits.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-3091.2011.01270.x",
    doi = "10.1111/j.1365-3091.2011.01270.x",
    openalex = "W2144500921",
    references = "doi101016s0037073896000577"
}

True substrates are defined as sedimentary bedding planes that demonstrably existed at the sediment-water or sediment-air interface at the time of deposition, as evidenced by features such as ripple marks or trace fossils. Here we describe true substrates from the Silurian Tumblagooda Sandstone of Western Australia, which have been identified by the presence of the surficial trace fossil Psammich nites. The examples are unexpected because they have developed along erosional internal bounding surfaces within a succession of cross-bedded sandstones. However, their seemingly counterintuitive preservation can be explained with reference to recent advances in our understanding of the time-incomplete sedimentary-stratigraphic record (SSR). The preservation of true substrates seems to be an inevitable and ordinary result of deposition in environments where sedimentary stasis and spatial variability play important roles. We show that the true substrates developed during high-frequency allogenic disturbance of migrating bedforms, forcing a redistribution of the loci of sedimentation within an estuarine setting, and subsequently permitting an interval of sedimentary stasis during which the erosional bounding surfaces could be colonized. These observations provide physical evidence that supports recent contentions of how sedimentary stasis and the interplay of allogenic and autogenic processes impart a traditionally underestimated complexity to the chronostratigraphic record of geological outcrop.

@article{doi101130g452061,
    author = "Davies, Neil S. and Shillito, Anthony P.",
    title = "Incomplete but intricately detailed: The inevitable preservation of true substrates in a time-deficient stratigraphic record",
    year = "2018",
    journal = "Geology",
    abstract = "True substrates are defined as sedimentary bedding planes that demonstrably existed at the sediment-water or sediment-air interface at the time of deposition, as evidenced by features such as ripple marks or trace fossils. Here we describe true substrates from the Silurian Tumblagooda Sandstone of Western Australia, which have been identified by the presence of the surficial trace fossil Psammich nites. The examples are unexpected because they have developed along erosional internal bounding surfaces within a succession of cross-bedded sandstones. However, their seemingly counterintuitive preservation can be explained with reference to recent advances in our understanding of the time-incomplete sedimentary-stratigraphic record (SSR). The preservation of true substrates seems to be an inevitable and ordinary result of deposition in environments where sedimentary stasis and spatial variability play important roles. We show that the true substrates developed during high-frequency allogenic disturbance of migrating bedforms, forcing a redistribution of the loci of sedimentation within an estuarine setting, and subsequently permitting an interval of sedimentary stasis during which the erosional bounding surfaces could be colonized. These observations provide physical evidence that supports recent contentions of how sedimentary stasis and the interplay of allogenic and autogenic processes impart a traditionally underestimated complexity to the chronostratigraphic record of geological outcrop.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1130/g45206.1",
    doi = "10.1130/g45206.1",
    openalex = "W2809597697",
    references = "doi101146annurevearth082517010129"
}

@article{doi101016jearscirev2019102979,
    author = "Davies, Neil S. and Shillito, Anthony P. and Slater, Ben J. and Liu, Alexander and McMahon, William J.",
    title = "Evolutionary synchrony of Earth’s biosphere and sedimentary-stratigraphic record",
    year = "2019",
    journal = "Earth-Science Reviews",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1016/j.earscirev.2019.102979",
    doi = "10.1016/j.earscirev.2019.102979",
    openalex = "W2992221908",
    references = "doi101016jearscirev201811009, doi101042etls20170156, doi10108002724634199710010948, doi101111j14754983200600594x, doi101111pala12350, doi101126scienceaar3689, doi101130g459491, doi101146annurevearth082517010129"
}

Abstract Climate, tectonics, and life influence the flux and caliber of sediment transported across Earth's surface. These environmental conditions can leave behind imprints in the Earth's sedimentary archive, but signals of climate, tectonic, and biologic change are not always present in the stratigraphic record. Deterministic and stochastic surface dynamics collectively act as a stratigraphic filter, impeding the burial and preservation of environmental signals in sedimentary deposits. Such impediments form a central challenge to accurately reconstructing environmental conditions through Earth's history. Emergent and self‐organized length and timescales in landscapes, which are themselves influenced by regional environmental conditions, define spatial and temporal sedimentation patterns in basins and fundamentally control the likelihood of environmental signal preservation in sedimentary deposits. Properly characterizing these scales provides a key avenue for incorporating the known “imperfections” of the stratigraphic record into paleoenvironmental reconstructions. These insights are necessary for answering both basic and applied science questions, including our ability to reconstruct the Earth system response to prior episodes of climate, tectonic, or land cover change.

@article{doi1010292019jf005079,
    author = "Straub, K. M. and Duller, Robert A. and Foreman, Brady Z. and Hajek, Elizabeth",
    title = "Buffered, Incomplete, and Shredded: The Challenges of Reading an Imperfect Stratigraphic Record",
    year = "2020",
    journal = "Journal of Geophysical Research Earth Surface",
    abstract = "Abstract Climate, tectonics, and life influence the flux and caliber of sediment transported across Earth's surface. These environmental conditions can leave behind imprints in the Earth's sedimentary archive, but signals of climate, tectonic, and biologic change are not always present in the stratigraphic record. Deterministic and stochastic surface dynamics collectively act as a stratigraphic filter, impeding the burial and preservation of environmental signals in sedimentary deposits. Such impediments form a central challenge to accurately reconstructing environmental conditions through Earth's history. Emergent and self‐organized length and timescales in landscapes, which are themselves influenced by regional environmental conditions, define spatial and temporal sedimentation patterns in basins and fundamentally control the likelihood of environmental signal preservation in sedimentary deposits. Properly characterizing these scales provides a key avenue for incorporating the known “imperfections” of the stratigraphic record into paleoenvironmental reconstructions. These insights are necessary for answering both basic and applied science questions, including our ability to reconstruct the Earth system response to prior episodes of climate, tectonic, or land cover change.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1029/2019jf005079",
    doi = "10.1029/2019jf005079",
    openalex = "W3008093022",
    references = "doi101016jancene201406001, doi101016jearscirev201511001, doi1010292011gl050197, doi101130g317161, doi101130g320681, doi101144gslsp19850180103, doi101146annurevearth082517010129, doi105962bhltitle45550"
}

Abstract The low temporal completeness of fluvial strata could indicate that recorded events represent unusual and extreme conditions. However, field observations suggest that preserved strata predominantly record relatively common transport conditions—a paradox termed the strange ordinariness of fluvial strata. We theorize that the self‐organization of fluvial systems into a morphodynamic hierarchy that spans bed to basin scales facilitates the preservation of ordinary events in fluvial strata. Using a new probabilistic model and existing field and experimental data sets across these scales, we show that fluvial morphodynamic hierarchy enhances the stratigraphic preservation of medial topography—ordinary events. We show that lower‐order landforms have a higher likelihood of complete preservation when the kinematic rates of evolution of successive levels in the morphodynamic hierarchy are comparable. We highlight how relative changes in kinematic rates of evolution of successive levels in the morphodynamic hierarchy can manifest as major shifts in stratigraphic architecture through Earth history.

@article{doi1010292020gl087921,
    author = "Ganti, Vamsi and Hajek, Elizabeth and Leary, Kate and Straub, K. M. and Paola, Chris",
    title = "Morphodynamic Hierarchy and the Fabric of the Sedimentary Record",
    year = "2020",
    journal = "Geophysical Research Letters",
    abstract = "Abstract The low temporal completeness of fluvial strata could indicate that recorded events represent unusual and extreme conditions. However, field observations suggest that preserved strata predominantly record relatively common transport conditions—a paradox termed the strange ordinariness of fluvial strata. We theorize that the self‐organization of fluvial systems into a morphodynamic hierarchy that spans bed to basin scales facilitates the preservation of ordinary events in fluvial strata. Using a new probabilistic model and existing field and experimental data sets across these scales, we show that fluvial morphodynamic hierarchy enhances the stratigraphic preservation of medial topography—ordinary events. We show that lower‐order landforms have a higher likelihood of complete preservation when the kinematic rates of evolution of successive levels in the morphodynamic hierarchy are comparable. We highlight how relative changes in kinematic rates of evolution of successive levels in the morphodynamic hierarchy can manifest as major shifts in stratigraphic architecture through Earth history.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1029/2020gl087921",
    doi = "10.1029/2020gl087921",
    openalex = "W3035745420",
    references = "doi101146annurevearth082517010129"
}

Orbital observation has revealed a rich record of fluvial landforms on Mars, with much of this record dating 3.6-3.0 Ga. Despite widespread geomorphic evidence, few analyses of Mars' alluvial sedimentary-stratigraphic record exist, with detailed studies of alluvium largely limited to smaller sand-bodies amenable to study in-situ by rovers. These typically metre-scale outcrop dimensions have prevented interpretation of larger scale channel-morphology and long-term basin evolution, vital for understanding the past Martian climate. Here we give an interpretation of a large sedimentary succession at Izola mensa within the NW Hellas Basin rim. The succession comprises channel and barform packages which together demonstrate that river deposition was already well established >3.7 Ga. The deposits mirror terrestrial analogues subject to low-peak discharge variation, implying that river deposition at Izola was subject to sustained, potentially perennial, fluvial flow. Such conditions would require an environment capable of maintaining large volumes of water for extensive time-periods, necessitating a precipitation-driven hydrological cycle.

@article{doi101038s41467020156220,
    author = "Salese, F. and McMahon, William J. and Balme, M. R. and Ansan, V. and Davis, J. M. and Kleinhans, Maarten G.",
    title = "Sustained fluvial deposition recorded in Mars’ Noachian stratigraphic record",
    year = "2020",
    journal = "Nature Communications",
    abstract = "Orbital observation has revealed a rich record of fluvial landforms on Mars, with much of this record dating 3.6-3.0 Ga. Despite widespread geomorphic evidence, few analyses of Mars' alluvial sedimentary-stratigraphic record exist, with detailed studies of alluvium largely limited to smaller sand-bodies amenable to study in-situ by rovers. These typically metre-scale outcrop dimensions have prevented interpretation of larger scale channel-morphology and long-term basin evolution, vital for understanding the past Martian climate. Here we give an interpretation of a large sedimentary succession at Izola mensa within the NW Hellas Basin rim. The succession comprises channel and barform packages which together demonstrate that river deposition was already well established >3.7 Ga. The deposits mirror terrestrial analogues subject to low-peak discharge variation, implying that river deposition at Izola was subject to sustained, potentially perennial, fluvial flow. Such conditions would require an environment capable of maintaining large volumes of water for extensive time-periods, necessitating a precipitation-driven hydrological cycle.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-15622-0",
    doi = "10.1038/s41467-020-15622-0",
    openalex = "W3021506631",
    references = "doi101146annurevearth082517010129"
}

Much of our understanding of Earth's past climate comes from the measurement of oxygen and carbon isotope variations in deep-sea benthic foraminifera. Yet, long intervals in existing records lack the temporal resolution and age control needed to thoroughly categorize climate states of the Cenozoic era and to study their dynamics. Here, we present a new, highly resolved, astronomically dated, continuous composite of benthic foraminifer isotope records developed in our laboratories. Four climate states-Hothouse, Warmhouse, Coolhouse, Icehouse-are identified on the basis of their distinctive response to astronomical forcing depending on greenhouse gas concentrations and polar ice sheet volume. Statistical analysis of the nonlinear behavior encoded in our record reveals the key role that polar ice volume plays in the predictability of Cenozoic climate dynamics.

@article{doi101126scienceaba6853,
    author = "Westerhold, Thomas and Marwan, Norbert and Drury, Anna Joy and Liebrand, Diederik and Agnini, Claudia and Anagnostou, Eleni and Barnet, James S K and Bohaty, Steven M. and Vleeschouwer, David De and Florindo, Fabio and Frederichs, Thomas and Hodell, David A and Holbourn, Ann and Kroon, Dick and Lauretano, Vittoria and Littler, Kate and Lourens, Lucas Joost and Lyle, Mitchell W and Pälike, Heiko and Röhl, Ursula and Tian, Jun and Wilkens, Roy H. and Wilson, Paul A. and Zachos, James C.",
    title = "An astronomically dated record of Earth’s climate and its predictability over the last 66 million years",
    year = "2020",
    journal = "Science",
    abstract = "Much of our understanding of Earth's past climate comes from the measurement of oxygen and carbon isotope variations in deep-sea benthic foraminifera. Yet, long intervals in existing records lack the temporal resolution and age control needed to thoroughly categorize climate states of the Cenozoic era and to study their dynamics. Here, we present a new, highly resolved, astronomically dated, continuous composite of benthic foraminifer isotope records developed in our laboratories. Four climate states-Hothouse, Warmhouse, Coolhouse, Icehouse-are identified on the basis of their distinctive response to astronomical forcing depending on greenhouse gas concentrations and polar ice sheet volume. Statistical analysis of the nonlinear behavior encoded in our record reveals the key role that polar ice volume plays in the predictability of Cenozoic climate dynamics.",
    url = "https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aba6853",
    doi = "10.1126/science.aba6853",
    openalex = "W3084856838",
    references = "doi101007s105840110156z, doi1010160025322771900533, doi1010160031018294902518, doi1010160033589473900525, doi101016b9780444594259000287, doi101016b9780444594259000299, doi101016jmargeo200502007, doi1010292001gl012943, doi1010292003pa000908, doi1010292007pa001458, doi1010292019pa003563, doi10102992jb01202, doi10102994jb03098, doi101029jc086ic10p09776, doi101029pa002i001p00001, doi10103835021000, doi101038nature03135, doi101038nature06588, doi101038ncomms14845, doi1010510004636120041335, doi10105100046361201116836, doi101111j1365246x1980tb02601x, doi101126sciadvaaz1346, doi101126science1059412, doi101126science1133822, doi101126science19442701121, doi101126science2875451269, doi105194cp76032011"
}