Stratigraphy And Depositional Environments Of Lower And Middle Cambrian Strata In The Lake Mead Region, Southern Nevada And Northwestern Arizona

The stratigraphy and depositional systems revealed within the Lower to Middle Cambrian Tapeats Sandstone-Pioche Shale-Lyndon Limestone-Chisholm Shale succession were studied between the easternmost limit of Cretaceous overthrusting in southern Nevada and the western edge of the Colorado Plateau in northwestern Arizona. Nine intergradational lithofacies were distinguished based on a rich suite of sedimentary structures, including lenticular-, wavy-, and flaser-bedding, wrinkle marks, herringbone cross-stratification, convolute bedding, primary current lineations, interference ripple marks, bird's eye structures, thrombolites, intraformational conglomerates, oncoids, cryptalgal laminites, and Arenicoloides, Corophioides, and Skolithos ichnofossils. The collective presence of these structures indicates that Lower and Middle Cambrian rocks in the study area were deposited in shallow-subtidal to supratidal settings; The proposed depositional model incorporates an east-west oriented Cambrian shoreline and asserts that the Lower and Middle Cambrian sequence represents a series of sedimentological responses to fluctuating rates of relative sea-level rise.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Science (MS)

Level thesis:degree_level

Thesis

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Geoscience

Grantor dc:publisher

University of Nevada, Las Vegas

Year

1997

Author dc:creator

• Hardy, Joseph Kirk

Statement dc:rights

• IN COPYRIGHT. For more information about this rights statement, please visit http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Language dc:language

English

Identifier

https://oasis.library.unlv.edu/rtds/6

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:oasis.library.unlv.edu:rtds-1005