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Research ArticleArticles

Stratigraphic evolution of the Neoproterozoic Callison Lake Formation: Linking the break-up of Rodinia to the Islay carbon isotope excursion

Justin V. Strauss, Francis A. MacDonald, Galen P. Halverson, Nicholas J. Tosca, Daniel P. Schrag and Andrew H. Knoll
American Journal of Science December 2015, 315 (10) 881-944; DOI: https://doi.org/10.2475/10.2015.01
Justin V. Strauss
* Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Harvard University, 20 Oxford Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138 USA
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  • For correspondence: Justin.V.Strauss@dartmouth.edu
Francis A. MacDonald
* Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Harvard University, 20 Oxford Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138 USA
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Galen P. Halverson
** Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences/Geotop, McGill University, 3450 University Street, Montreal, QC H3A 0E8 CANADA
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Nicholas J. Tosca
*** Department of Earth Sciences, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford, OX1 3AN United Kingdom
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Daniel P. Schrag
* Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Harvard University, 20 Oxford Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138 USA
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Andrew H. Knoll
* Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Harvard University, 20 Oxford Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138 USA
**** Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, 24 Oxford Street, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138 USA
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Abstract

The ∼780 to 540 Ma Windermere Supergroup of western North America records the protracted development of the western Laurentian passive margin and provides insights into the nature, timing, and kinematics of Rodinia's fragmentation. Here we present a refined tectono- and chemo-stratigraphic model for circa 780 to 720 Ma sedimentation in NW Canada through a study of the Callison Lake Formation (formalized herein) of the Mount Harper Group, spectacularly exposed in the Coal Creek and Hart River inliers of the Ogilvie Mountains of Yukon, Canada. Twenty-one stratigraphic sections are integrated with geological mapping, facies analysis, carbon and oxygen isotope chemostratigraphy, and Re-Os geochronology to provide a depositional reconstruction for the Callison Lake Formation. Mixed siliciclastic, carbonate, and evaporite sediments accumulated in marginal marine embayments formed in discrete hangingwall depocenters of a prominent Windermere extensional fault zone. Deposition of the Windermere Supergroup in NW Canada post dates the eruption of the circa 780 Ma Gunbarrel Large Igneous Province by ∼30 million years, is locally associated with compressional or transpressional tectonism, and predates the successful rift-drift transition by ∼200 million years. In order to accommodate evidence for coeval extensional and compressional tectonism, abrupt facies change, and Neoproterozoic fault geometries, we propose that NW Laurentia experienced strike-slip deformation during the ∼740 to 660 Ma early fragmentation of the supercontinent Rodinia. Sequence stratigraphic data from the Callison Lake Formation and other basal Windermere successions in the northern Canadian Cordillera delineate three distinct depositional sequences, or transgressive-regressive (T-R) cycles, that are coeval with similar stratigraphic packages in the ∼780 to 720 Ma Chuar-Uinta Mountain-Pahrump basins of the western United States. The global circa 735 Ma Islay carbon isotope excursion is consistently present in carbonate strata of the third T-R cycle and is interpreted to represent a primary perturbation to the global carbon cycle, possibly driven by the uplift and weathering of extensive shallow epicontinental seaways and evaporite basins.

  • Windermere Supergroup
  • Neoproterozoic chemostratigraphy
  • Islay carbon isotope excursion
  • Mount Harper Group
  • Callison Lake Formation
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American Journal of Science: 315 (10)
American Journal of Science
Vol. 315, Issue 10
1 Dec 2015
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Stratigraphic evolution of the Neoproterozoic Callison Lake Formation: Linking the break-up of Rodinia to the Islay carbon isotope excursion
Justin V. Strauss, Francis A. MacDonald, Galen P. Halverson, Nicholas J. Tosca, Daniel P. Schrag, Andrew H. Knoll
American Journal of Science Dec 2015, 315 (10) 881-944; DOI: 10.2475/10.2015.01

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Stratigraphic evolution of the Neoproterozoic Callison Lake Formation: Linking the break-up of Rodinia to the Islay carbon isotope excursion
Justin V. Strauss, Francis A. MacDonald, Galen P. Halverson, Nicholas J. Tosca, Daniel P. Schrag, Andrew H. Knoll
American Journal of Science Dec 2015, 315 (10) 881-944; DOI: 10.2475/10.2015.01
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  • Article
    • Abstract
    • INTRODUCTION
    • GEOLOGICAL BACKGROUND AND PREVIOUS WORK
    • STRATIGRAPHIC FRAMEWORK AND FORMALIZATION OF THE MOUNT HARPER GROUP
    • METHODS
    • SEDIMENTOLOGY AND STRATIGRAPHY OF THE CALLISON LAKE FORMATION
    • SEQUENCE STRATIGRAPHY OF THE CALLISON LAKE FORMATION
    • CARBONATE CARBON AND OXYGEN ISOTOPE RESULTS
    • DISCUSSION
    • CONCLUSIONS
    • ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
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Keywords

  • Windermere Supergroup
  • Neoproterozoic chemostratigraphy
  • Islay carbon isotope excursion
  • Mount Harper Group
  • Callison Lake Formation

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