New records of Ediacaran Acraman ejecta in drillholes from the Stuart Shelf and Officer Basin, South Australia

Andrew C. Hill*, Peter W. Haines, Kathleen Grey, Sebastian Willman

*Corresponding author for this work

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

    16 Citations (Scopus)

    Abstract

    New occurrences of the Acraman impact ejecta layer were recently discovered in two South Australian drillholes, SCYW-79 1a (Stuart Shelf) and Munta 1 (Officer Basin) using lithostratigraphy, acritarch biostratigraphy, carbon isotope stratigraphy, and biomarker anomalies to predict the stratigraphic position. The ejecta layer is conspicuous because it consists of pink, sand-sized, angular fragments of volcanic rock distributed along the bedding plane surface of green marine siltstone. In SCYW-79 1a it forms a layer 5 mm thick; in Munta 1 the ejecta layer is thin and discontinuous because of its distance (∼550 km) from the impact structure. Palynological, biomarker, and carbon isotope anomalies can now be shown to coincide with the ejecta layer in SCYW-79 1a and Munta 1 suggesting the Acraman impact event may have had far reaching influences on the rapidly evolving Ediacaran biological and geochemical cycles.

    Original languageEnglish
    Pages (from-to)1883-1891
    Number of pages9
    JournalMeteoritics and Planetary Science
    Volume42
    Issue number11
    Publication statusPublished - Nov 2007

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