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BIOTURBATION IN CAMBRIAN SILICICLASTIC SHELF STRATA:
PALEOECOLOGICAL, PALEOENVIRONMENTAL, AND TEMPORAL
PATTERNS
by
Katherine Nicholson Marenco
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
(GEOLOGICAL SCIENCES)
December 2008
Copyright 2008 Katherine Nicholson Marenco
Object Description
| Title | Bioturbation in Cambrian siliciclastic shelf strata: paleoecological, paleoenvironmental, and temporal patterns |
| Author | Marenco, Katherine Nicholson |
| Author email | kathnich81@hotmail.com; kanichol@usc.edu |
| Degree | Doctor of Philosophy |
| Document type | Dissertation |
| Degree program | Geological Sciences |
| School | College of Letters, Arts and Sciences |
| Date defended/completed | 2008-08-21 |
| Date submitted | 2008 |
| Restricted until | Unrestricted |
| Date published | 2008-10-10 |
| Advisor (committee chair) | Bottjer, David J. |
| Advisor (committee member) |
Corsetti, Frank A. Gorsline, Donn S. Fischer, Alfred G. Ziebis, Wiebke |
| Abstract | Cambrian rocks record the morphological and behavioral diversification of early metazoans. Bioturbation was predominantly bedding-parallel during the Early Cambrian due to a combination of evolutionary and ecological factors. Consequently, trace fossils are typically preserved on bedding planes in Lower Cambrian siliciclastic strata. The overarching goal of this work was to gain a better understanding of the agronomic revolution as it occurred in shallow marine to transitional environments by studying the bioturbation preserved on Lower Cambrian bedding plane exposures. The objectives of this study were as follows: (1) develop a precise, quantitative method for evaluating bioturbation on bedding planes; (2) apply this and other methods to Lower Cambrian rocks of the Death Valley region and southern Sweden, which represent similar depositional settings; (3) compare the resulting bedding plane bioturbation data with data previously collected from the Lower Cambrian succession in the White-Inyo Mountains; and (4) study the distribution of bioturbation across exceptionally-large bedding planes in the Upper Cambrian of Wisconsin to determine whether small bedding planes effectively sample the bioturbation that is present across sedimentary horizons.; The intersection grid method was developed to estimate the percentage area of bioturbation on bedding planes. A test of the method demonstrated that results within 5-10 percent error can be obtained even at relatively coarse grid scales. This method was applied to bedding planes from the Lower Cambrian succession in the Death Valley region. Results of these analyses, which have a moderately broad distribution with a cluster between 5-25 percent bioturbation, are typical of Lower Cambrian rocks, in which bioturbation intensities are relatively low. However, an abundance of vertical burrows in coarse-grained rocks in the Death Valley region and southern Sweden indicates that vertical bioturbation, rather than horizontal bioturbation, was dominant in Early Cambrian nearshore settings. In addition, common vertical burrows in rocks of heterogeneous grain size in the Death Valley Lower Cambrian succession suggests that adaptations to burrowing vertically into fine-grained material may have first appeared in nearshore settings. Data from large Upper Cambrian exposures in Wisconsin demonstrate that ancient bedding planes, like modern intertidal zones, can exhibit considerable heterogeneity. |
| Keyword | bioturbation; trace fossils; bedding planes; Cambrian; agronomic revolution; ecosystem engineering; Death Valley; White-Inyo Mountains; California; Nevada; Wisconsin; Sweden |
| Geographic subject | valleys: Death Valley; mountains: Inyo Mountains; mountains: White Mountains |
| Geographic subject (state) | California; Nevada; Wisconsin |
| Geographic subject (country) | Sweden |
| Coverage era | Cambrian |
| Language | English |
| Part of collection | University of Southern California dissertations and theses |
| Publisher (of the original version) | University of Southern California |
| Place of publication (of the original version) | Los Angeles, California |
| Publisher (of the digital version) | University of Southern California. Libraries |
| Provenance | Electronically uploaded by the author |
| Type | texts |
| Legacy record ID | usctheses-m1652 |
| Rights | Marenco, Katherine Nicholson |
| Repository name | Libraries, University of Southern California |
| Repository address | Los Angeles, California |
| Repository email | http://www.usc.edu/isd/libraries/services/ask_a_librarian/email/ |
| Filename | etd-Marenco-2406 |
| Archival file | uscthesesreloadpub_Volume26/etd-Marenco-2406.pdf |
Description
| Title | Page 1 |
| Full text | BIOTURBATION IN CAMBRIAN SILICICLASTIC SHELF STRATA: PALEOECOLOGICAL, PALEOENVIRONMENTAL, AND TEMPORAL PATTERNS by Katherine Nicholson Marenco A Dissertation Presented to the FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY (GEOLOGICAL SCIENCES) December 2008 Copyright 2008 Katherine Nicholson Marenco |
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