Location maps of Nullarbor Plain: satellite tv for pc picture (A), Shuttle Radar Topography Mission digital elevation mannequin (SRTM DEM) picture (B) and geological map (C). The rectangle in B reveals the placement of Figure 2. Geology based mostly on SurfaceGeology of Australia, 1:1 000 000 scale, 2012 version (Geoscience Australia, 2012). AL = Oligocene-Miocene Abrakurrie Limestone; C = colluvium and residual deposits; CS = Miocene Colville Sandstone; D = dunes; NL = Miocene Nullarbor Limestone; NLm = Mullamullang Member of the Nullarbor Limestone; RC = Pliocene-Pleistocene Roe Calcarenite; RSC =residual sediments and calcrete; SSM = Holocene Semaphore Sand Member of the Saint Kilda Formation. Credit: Earth Surface Processes and Landforms (2022). DOI: 10.1002/esp.5459
Curtin University researchers and worldwide collaborators utilizing superior satellite tv for pc imagery have found an historic reef-like landform “hidden” in plain view on the Nullarbor Plain, which has been preserved for thousands and thousands of years because it first fashioned when the Plain was underwater.
Research creator Dr. Milo Barham, from the Timescales of Mineral Systems Group inside Curtin’s School of Earth and Planetary Sciences, mentioned the discovering additional challenged the understanding that the Nullarbor Plain, which emerged from the ocean about 14 million years in the past, was primarily flat and featureless.
“Unlike many components of the world, massive areas of the Nullarbor Plain have remained largely unchanged by weathering and erosion processes over thousands and thousands of years, making it a singular geological canvas recording historic historical past in exceptional methods,” Dr. Barham mentioned.
“Through high-resolution satellite tv for pc imagery and fieldwork we now have recognized the clear remnant of an authentic seabed construction preserved for thousands and thousands of years, which is the primary of this type of landform found on the Nullarbor Plain.
“The ring-shaped ‘hill’ can’t be defined by extra-terrestrial affect or any identified deformation processes however preserves authentic microbial textures and options sometimes discovered within the fashionable Great Barrier Reef.”
Dr. Barham mentioned the invention was because of larger entry to new high-resolution satellite tv for pc imagery, which revealed delicate options representing shocking histories of environmental evolution on the Nullarbor Plain.
“Evidence of the channels of long-vanished rivers, in addition to sand dune techniques imprinted instantly into limestone, protect an archive of historic landscapes and even a file of the prevailing winds. And it’s not solely landscapes. Isolated cave shafts punctuating the Nullarbor Plain protect mummified stays of Tasmanian tigers and full skeletons of long-extinct wonders equivalent to Thylacoleo, the marsupial lion,” Dr. Barham mentioned.
“At the floor, because of the comparatively secure circumstances, the Nullarbor Plain has preserved massive portions of meteorites, permitting us to look again by way of time to the origins of our photo voltaic system.
“These options, along with the thousands and thousands of years previous panorama function we now have now recognized, successfully make the Nullarbor Plain a land that point forgot and permit an enchanting deeper understanding of Earth’s historical past.”
Dr. Barham is affiliated with The Institute for Geoscience Research (TIGeR), Curtin’s flagship Earth Sciences analysis institute.
Titled “Enigmatic annular landform on a Miocene planar karst floor, Nullarbor Plain, Australia” and to be printed in Earth Surface Processes And Landforms, the analysis was led by Dr. Matej Lipar from the Anton Melik Geographical Institute on the Research Center of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts.
New approach unlocks historic historical past of Earth from grains of sand
More data:
Matej Lipar et al, Enigmatic annular landform on a Miocene planar karst floor, Nullarbor Plain, Australia, Earth Surface Processes and Landforms (2022). DOI: 10.1002/esp.5459
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Study finds historic reef construction excessive and dry on the Nullarbor Plain (2022, September 7)
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