The South Shetland Islands, Antarctica: Lithostratigraphy and geological map

作者：Joaquin Bastías, David Chew, Camila Villanueva, Teal R. Riley, Joseline Manfroi, Cristine Trevisan, Marcelo Leppe, Paula Castillo, Fernando Poblete, Dieter Tetzner, Grégory Giuliani, Bastián López, Hong Chen, Guanggao Zheng, Yue Zhao, Liang Gao, Anna Rauch, Ricardo Jaña · 发表于：Frontiers in Earth Science · 年份：2023 · DOI：10.3389/feart.2022.1002760 · 被引用次数：23 · 研究领域：Geology and Paleoclimatology Research、Polar Research and Ecology、Cryospheric studies and observations

Over the last few decades, numerous geological studies have been carried out in the South Shetland Islands, which have greatly contributed to a better understanding of its geological evolution. However, few attempts have been conducted to correlate the geological units throughout this archipelago. We present herein a review of the literature available in the South Shetland Islands, which we use to propose a lithostratigraphical correlation that constitutes a coherent stratigraphy for the main Mesozoic and Cenozoic rocks of the South Shetland Islands along with a new geological map. The lithostratigraphical correlation shows that the geological and environmental evolution comprises three main stages: 1) deep marine sedimentation from ∼164 to 140 Ma, 2) subaerial volcanism and sedimentation with a proliferation of plants and fauna from ∼140 to 35 Ma and 3) glacial and interglacial deposits from ∼35 Ma. The lithostratigraphical correlation also shows a broad geographical trend of decreasing age of volcanism from southwest to northeast, which has been previously suggested. However, this spatial age trend is disrupted by the presence of Eocene magmatism in Livingston Island, located in the centre of the archipelago. We suggest that the migration of volcanism occurred from the Late Cretaceous until the early Eocene. Subsequently, enhanced magmatic activity took place from the mid-Eocene until the Miocene, which we associate with processes related with the waning of subduction. Cons...