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Science 13 September 1985:
Vol. 229. no. 4718, pp. 1085 - 1087
DOI: 10.1126/science.229.4718.1085
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Articles

Episodic Rifting of Phanerozoic Rocks in the Victoria Land Basin, Western Ross Sea, Antarctica

ALAN K. COOPER 1 and F. J. DAVEY 2

1 U.S. Geological Survey, Menlo Park, California 94025
2 Geophysical Division, DSIR, Wellington, New Zealand

Multichannel seismic-reflection data show that the Victoria Land-basin, unlike other sedimentary basins in the Ross Sea, includes a rift-depression 15 to 25 kilometers wide that parallels the Transantarctic Mountains and contains up to 12 kilometers of possible Paleozoic to Holocene age sedimentary rocks. An unconformity separates the previously identified Cenozoic sedimentary section from the underlying strata of possible Mesozoic and Paleozoic age. Late Cenozoic volcanic rocks intrude into the entire section along the eastern flank of the basin. The Victoria Land basin is probably part of a more extensive rift system that has been active episodically since Paleozoic time. Inferred rifting and basin subsidence during Mesozoic and Cenozoic time may be associated with regional crustal extension and uplift of the nearby Transantarctic Mountains.

Submitted on March 11, 1985
Accepted on July 9, 1985


THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES:
Late Quaternary faulting and neotectonics, South Victoria Land, Antarctica.
S. JONES (1997)
Journal of the Geological Society 154, 645-652
   Abstract »    PDF »
Lateral Isotopic Discontinuity in the Lower Crust: An Example from Antarctica.
R. I. Kalamarides, R. I. KALAMARIDES, J. H. BERG, and R. A. HANK (1987)
Science 237, 1192-1195
   Abstract »    PDF »


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