Detailed dinoflagellate cyst analysis of the Lower–Middle Miocene Berchem Formation at the southernmost margin of the North Sea Basin (northern Belgium) allowed a precise biostratigraphical positioning and a reconstruction of the depositional history. The two lower members of the formation (Edegem Sands and decalcified Kiel Sands) are biostratigraphically regarded as one unit since no significant break within the dinocyst assemblages is observed. The base of this late (or latest) Aquitanian–Burdigalian unit coincides with sequence boundary Aq3/Bur1 as defined by Hardenbol and others, in work published in 1998. A hiatus at the Lower–Middle Miocene transition separates the upper member (the Antwerpen Sands) from the underlying member. The greater part of the Antwerpen Sands were deposited in a Langhian (latest Burdigalian?)–middle Serravallian interval. The base of this unit coincides with sequence boundary Bur5/Lan1. Biostratigraphical correlation points to a diachronous post-depositional decalcification within the formation since parts of the decalcified Kiel Sands can be correlated with parts of the calcareous fossil-bearing section, up to now interpreted as Antwerpen Sands. The dinoflagellate cyst assemblages are dominated by species with a inner neritic preference, although higher numbers of oceanic taxa in the upper part of the formation indicate incursions of oceanic watermasses into the confined depositional environment of the southern North Sea Basin.

Within a largely concealed, caldera-related volcaniclastic succession of the Ordovician Borrowdale Volcanic Group in the western Lake District, two thick (100–350 m) ignimbrites within the Fleming Hall Formation exhibit a number of features that in combination make them unusual deposits. They are both homogeneous with comparatively low-SiO2 (63%) bulk composition, contain only a moderate crystal content, are generally poor in lithic clasts, show uniformly very dense welding (yielding parataxitic to massive vitrophyric texture) throughout and lack associated fall-out or surge deposits. Ignimbrites of comparable bulk composition in this geological setting are usually part of zoned sheets and/or frequently very crystal-rich. Large-scale, unzoned densely welded ignimbrites are usually rhyodacitic to rhyolitic. By contrast, ignimbrites of intermediate composition that display dense welding are relatively small deposits that form by agglutination of hot, plastic spatter.

It is postulated that the Fleming Hall ignimbrites were derived from low column height, low explosivity eruptions that conserved heat and minimized entrainment of accidental lithic clasts and the formation of fine ash. The very dense welding and lack of bubble-wall shard vitroclastic textures indicate that pyroclasts were hot and relatively dry, probably occurring as mildly vesicular (scoriaceous) fragments which welded or fused together during aggradational deposition rather than by post-depositional compactional loading. There is little variation in the degree of matrix or melt crystallization throughout the two ignimbrites, despite the fact that high temperatures must have been maintained for many years following deposition. Both display virtually ubiquitous development of micropoikilitic glass devitrification texture, which suggests that the viscosity of the supercooled dacitic melt was sufficiently high, probably due to initial degassing, to inhibit significant melt crystallization after deposition.

The eruption of the Fleming Hall magmas was probably initiated by the rise or injection of hotter, more basic, magma, and not by overpressurization due to volatile exsolution resulting from cooling and crystallization. Foundering of the chamber roof caused forcible and rapid eruption of the magma, probably along a series of volcanotectonic faults rather than a central vent, and probably flooded the resultant caldera depression. It is predicted that this type of eruption will not have produced a widely dispersed deposit, the bulk of which may have been largely contained within its own caldera.

In recent years, platinum-group mineral deposits have been reported from several of the Tertiary igneous complexes in East Greenland. These intrusions form part of the same igneous province as the Tertiary igneous centres in northwest Scotland, and recent work confirmed the presence of abundant platinum-group minerals in the Rum Central Complex. In this paper we report for the first time the presence of abundant and diverse platinum-group minerals from the Tertiary Ben Buie intrusion on Mull and the Cuillin Complex of Skye, Inner Hebrides, Scotland. The platinum-group minerals in the Ben Buie intrusion are associated with chromitite layers in ultramafic cumulates. The grains are small (1–2 μm), locally very abundant, and dominated by Pd–Bi–Te–Sb phases. In the Peridotite Series of the Cuillin Complex, the platinum-group minerals are dominated by laurite commonly enclosed within chromite or silicate. A combined orthomagmatic–hydromagmatic origin is proposed for the mineralization. However, the style and type of mineralization differs between each of the igneous centres. Platinum-group element mineralization is a ubiquitous feature of the Tertiary Igneous Province in northwest Scotland and in Greenland and is intimately linked to the regional tectonic setting.

Marine vertebrate faunas from the latest Cretaceous phosphates of the Palmyrides Chain of Syria are described for the first time. Recent fieldwork in the phosphatic deposits of the Palmyra area (mines of Charquieh and Khneifiss, outcrops of Bardeh, Soukkari and Soukhneh) have yielded a rich and diversified assemblage of marine vertebrates, including more than 50 species of chondrichthyes, osteichthyes, squamates, chelonians, plesiosaurians and crocodilians. Selachians are the most abundant and diverse component of the faunas and are represented by at least 34 species of both sharks and rays. Actinopterygians include representatives of six families, the most common being the enchodontids. Squamates are known by six mosasaurid species and an indeterminate varanoid. Chelonians are represented by at least two bothremydids and two chelonioids. Finally, elasmosaurid plesiosaurs and indeterminate crocodilians are also present in the fossil assemblages. The difference in faunal composition observed between the sites is interpreted as being due to palaeoecological preferences related to the Hamad Uplift palaeostructure. The marine vertebrate faunas of Syria show close affinities with those of the latest Cretaceous phosphatic deposits of North Africa and the Middle East and are typical of the southern Tethyan realm. From a biostratigraphical point of view, the selachians are the only suitable material to provide elements of an answer to the long debated question of the age of the Syrian Senonian phosphates. They suggest an Early Maastrichtian age for most of the phosphates of the Palmyrides Chain.

The Pan-African Ambalavayal granite intrudes the high-grade metamorphic terrain of northern Kerala, South India and is spatially associated with the Moyar and Calicut lineaments. The pluton was aligned nearly parallel to the northeast–southwest and east–west faults in the basement, consistent with magma ascent along pre-existing deep-crustal lineaments in an extensional tectonic regime. The pluton is characterized by the presence of iron-rich hydrous mafic minerals, primary magnetite, fO2 above the Ni–NiO buffer and high initial emplacement temperatures near 1000 °C. Modal and textural analyses reveal two probable compositional zones within the pluton: outer and inner. Major element variations support this zoning and point to a peralkaline to metaluminous outer zone and a metaluminous to slightly peraluminous inner zone. Both zones exhibit major and trace element characteristics of the A-type granites with the outer zone belonging to the A1 subtype and the inner zone to the A2 subtype of Eby. The trace element trends observed from outer zone to the inner zone suggests that crystal fractionation may have been the dominant process in the generation of high levels of the incompatible elements in the case of inner zone samples. The high initial 87Sr/86Sr ratio (0.7135) and high Y/Nb ratios (Y/Nb > 1.2) are in the range expected for rocks derived from crustal protoliths. A petrogenetic model involving partial melting of a charnockitic, mafic to intermediate lower crust followed by limited fractional crystallization of the magma in a high-level magma chamber is proposed. The enrichment of HFSE and REE (except Eu) in the inner zone is considered the ultimate product of crystal–melt and volatile activity during the final stage of crystallization in a highly silicic (SiO2 > 74%) magma chamber.

Three extensional phases can be recognized in the northern, Anglona area of the Oligo-Miocene Sardinian Rift during a fifteen million year period which spanned Corsica–Sardinia continental microplate separation and Western Mediterranean back-arc basin opening. In response to this multiphase rifting, a complex facies architecture involving clastic, carbonate and volcanic rocks developed. Integrated onshore facies and structural analysis, dating and offshore seismic data are here used to reconstruct the tectono-stratigraphic history of the Anglona area. Initial late Oligocene extension created a half-graben geometry with syn-rift clastic deposits shed locally from fault-bounded highs, passing laterally to lacustrine marlstones. Calc-alkaline volcanic activity subsequently predominated as volcanic centres developed along one half-graben bounding fault. Voluminous pyroclastic and epiclastic material was supplied to the adjacent half-graben accommodation space and was deposited in marginal to marine conditions. Second-phase mid-Aquitanian–early Burdigalian extensional faulting, recognized from localized clastic syn-rift stratal wedges, truncated and subdivided the half-graben. The syn-rift sediments were sealed by a regionally correlated ignimbrite that in turn was offset by late second-phase faulting. Third-phase extensional fault movement which reactivated the original fault trend then occurred. A perched lake developed in the resultant topography coeval with the progressive marine transgression of lower areas. As sea-level rose during mid-Burdigalian times, reefal carbonates and grainstones developed on fault-block highs whilst calcarenites and marlstones were deposited in hangingwall locations. Initial extension was coeval with the formation of the Sardinian proto-rift and the initiation of the Western Mediterranean basin. Second-phase faulting occurred as the Corsica–Sardinia microplate rotated to its present position during Western Mediterranean back-arc basin spreading. Final extension can be correlated to a second major extension phase along the Oligo-Miocene Sardinian Rift following back-arc basin opening, as extension was transferred towards the fore-arc. In Anglona, the main influence of multiphase tectonism was on rift topography, providing accommodation space and localized uplifted source areas. Varying relative sea-level mainly controlled the broad types of facies belts that developed. Contemporaneous calc-alkaline volcanism played a major role in the supply of basin filling material and in changing the topography locally.

A large temnospondyl mandible from the Lystrosaurus Assemblage Zone (Early Triassic) of South Africa is referred to the higher-level taxon Trematosauridae. The mandible is remarkably similar to that described for Trematosaurus from the Middle Buntsandstein of Germany, a genus closely related to the South African Trematosuchus, for which the mandible is unknown. However, the mandible cannot be referred unequivocally to either of these taxa. Trematosuchus is considered to be restricted to the lowermost subzone of the overlying Cynognathus Assemblage Zone, which, based principally on the temnospondyl and therapsid fauna, is considered to be of Upper Olenekian age. The mandible described here extends back the range of the Trematosauridae to the underlying Lystrosaurus Assemblage Zone and argues against the long-held notion of a sharp palaeontological break between the faunas of the Lystrosaurus and Cynognathus Assemblage zones. It also supports the hypothesis that the Lystrosaurus Assemblage Zone extended up to the Upper Olenekian.

Conodont faunas from the Arenigian Lanna/Volkhov Stage in Baltoscandia have been the subject of intensive study, particularly during the last decade, and different biozonations based on them have been proposed. The application of some of these zones is discussed here. The present investigation is mainly based on 64 samples from ten sections in Sweden, but conodont collections from Bornholm (Denmark) and Tamsalu (Estonia) have also been studied. Lindström's (1971) concept of the upper Arenigian Microzarkodina parva Zone is essentially replaced by a revised Baltoniodus norrlandicus Zone. The zone corresponds closely to Bagnoli & Stouge's (1997) recently distinguished B. norrlandicus and Lenodus antivariabilis zones, which can be recognized in sections where a more detailed subdivision and correlation is possible under the names of the T. quadrangulum Subzone and the L. antivariabilis Subzone, respectively.

Late Cretaceous and Miocene collisions of the Arabian, Anatolian and Eurasian plates, as shown by widespread ophiolitic exposures along the suture, created favourable geological conditions for the formation of the surface and subsurface structures in the Gaziantep Basin, southeast Turkey. The late Cretaceous (Maastrichtian) emplacement of the Kocali–Karadut ophiolite complex induced subsidence in the northwestern zone of the Kastel Basin during the early Alpine Orogeny and influenced the structural evolution of the foreland area. The Dead Sea Fault, which originated in the Red Sea in Miocene time, propagated towards the northwest in the Suez Gulf and the north-northeast in southeast Turkey, and influenced the structural evolution of the Gaziantep Basin. These two major tectonic events produced many thrusts, thrust-related subsurface and surface anticlines, faults, fractures, flower structures and basaltic flows in the area. Geological and geophysical investigations indicate the existence of two important structural phases. The older structures were formed during the late Cretaceous movements, but they have been reactivated by latest Miocene tectonic activities with appearance of the Strands of the Dead Sea Fault in the sedimentary basin. The geothermal studies show also that, as a result of the Tertiary transgressions and volcanic activity, the northern and southern sectors of the Gaziantep Basin underwent differing subsidence and structural histories.

Lower Palaeozoic rocks in the Karadere-Zirze area, east of Safranbolu (Pontides, northern Turkey), range from Early Ordovician to Silurian. Overlying the probably Tremadoc Bakacak Formation are Aydos Formation quartzites, followed conformably by the Karadere Formation, dated as Early Arenig to Early Llanvirn by means of graptolites which are assigned to seventeen genera and include three new forms: Eoglyptograptus bouceki, Prolasiograptus haplus praecursor and Undulograptus? mui. Late Arenig trilobites from the Karadere Formation include Bergamia, Cyclopyge, Dionidella?, Leioshumardia and Seleneceme. In the Limestone Member of the overlying Ketencikdere Formation, uncommon trilobites suggest only a mid- to late Ordovician age, but conodonts with Colour Alteration Index 5–6 indicate the Amorphognathus tvaerensis Biozone (early Caradoc). Macrofossils are rare in the Siltstone Member, but conodonts from the middle of the unit suggest the highest subzone of the A. tvaerensis Biozone; the youngest visible strata are, on acritarch evidence, at least as high as Caradoc, but the Ashgill is not confirmed and the contact with overlying Silurian rocks is unexposed. The Findikli Formation comprises: a Lower Member, black argillites with Llandovery graptolites and acritarchs; and an Upper Member, grey shales with late Wenlock graptolites, overlain unconformably by Devonian rocks. The succession differs significantly from contemporaneous deposits in southern Turkey and its affinities lie with western Europe, including the Welsh Basin.

Most bolides that collide with the Earth hit the sea. Limited knowledge about marine-target impacts hampers predictions about their perilousness. This study presents geological features that are particular to craters formed at sea. The features are most likely a result of the influence of the target on the cratering process. Marine-target craters form only if the target sea is shallow enough to admit sufficient kinetic energy into the sea bed. When the crater diameter is large compared to the water depth, the crater resembles its counterparts that are formed on land. Craters formed in deeper water are concentric, and often lack melt sheets and rim walls, but have deposits and radial gullies formed by the resurge of the sea. Impacts on the deep shelf are probably much more energetic than is suggested by the dimensions of the preserved crater.

Thin bioclastic limestone beds (‘coquinas’) in the Vectis Formation (Wealden Group, Lower Cretaceous) of the Isle of Wight, southern England, exhibit a range of biofabrics and internal stratigraphies. These features are attributed to both simple and complex storm deposition of allochthonous biogenic and siliciclastic materials in coastal lagoons and on adjacent mudflats. These modes of deposition facilitated preservation of dinosaur trackways, desiccation cracks, shallow-tier trace fossils and in situ bivalve colonies through rapid burial. The coquinas thus preserve a record of surficial muds, commonly lost through reworking. The principal components of the coquinas comprise dispersed elements from within the argillaceous ‘background’ facies. Some of these beds are laterally traceable for up to 27 km, providing the foundations for a high-resolution event-stratigraphic framework.

In the Grampian (Ordovician) orogenic belt in northwestern Ireland the Dalradian Supergroup abuts and interleaves with an enigmatic psammite-dominant unit, with relict latest Precambrian granulite-facies assemblages, known as the Slishwood Division. These two units were most likely tectonically juxtaposed during the D3 phase of Dalradian deformation. Using Ar–Ar, Rb–Sr and Sm–Nd methods, 53 new mineral ages have been obtained from both rock units, and from pegmatites intruding them, in an attempt to constrain the timing of their juxtaposition and the history they subsequently shared. Prior to D3 (c. 480 Ma), retrograde hornblende poikiloblasts grew in granulite-facies metabasite pods within the Slishwood Division. Tectonic juxtaposition (D3) with the Dalradian is loosely constrained between 479 Ma and 459 Ma but is likely to have occurred between 470 Ma and 459 Ma. Dalradian peak metamorphic conditions were attained shortly after D3, at around 460 Ma. Extensional collapse of the orogen, with rapid uplift and exhumation, is dated by an abundance of mineral cooling ages between 460 Ma and 450 Ma. Orogenic collapse is also dated, more precisely, by widespread pegmatite intrusion into both rock units at about 455 Ma. Initial 87Sr/86Sr ratios suggest that these pegmatites are partial melts from Dalradian metasediments. A second suite of pegmatites were intruded, along with the Ox Mountains Granodiorite, much later at or around 400 Ma during sinistral shearing.

The Klematia–Paramythia basin is an internal part of the middle Ionian zone of the Hellenide orogen in western Greece. It consists of Middle Eocene to Late Miocene turbidites, up to 3300 m thick, which were deposited in a series of submarine fans. Field studies suggest that the configuration and the depositional environments of the basin were affected by two tectonic phases. During the first tectonic phase, in Middle Eocene to Late Oligocene times, a foreland basin was formed west of the Pindos Thrust front. During the second tectonic phase, in the Early Miocene, the Ionian zone (a part of the foreland basin) was subdivided by internal thrusting into three sub-basins (internal, middle and external) and changed to a complex type foreland basin. Comparison of the type and facies associations of the turbidite deposits that accumulated within the basin suggests that these two tectonic phases had a significant effect on sedimentary dispersal patterns. During the first tectonic phase in the Klematia–Paramythia basin (when it was part of the foreland basin), fine-grained turbidites, up to 1050 m thick, accumulated on the distal part of a submarine fan. The lower part (900 m thick) of these deposits consists of thin to thick interbedded sandstone/mudstone beds which are interpreted as lobes and lobe-fringe (outer-fan) deposits. The upper parts (150 m thick) of these deposits are composed of very thin to thin siltstone/mudstone beds, representing a basin plain environment. During the second tectonic phase, sediments up to 2260 m thick were deposited in the Klematia–Paramythia basin. These deposits are interpreted as lobes and lobe-fringe (outer-fan) fine-grained turbidites in the central part of the basin, channel and interchannel deposits (inner-fan) in some areas of the periphery of the basin, and shelf deposits in the northern and southern terminations of the basin.

The Caledonian Horn Head Slide is a spectacular ductile shear zone transecting Neoproterozoic Appin Group Dalradian metasediments in Donegal (NW Ireland). Two conflicting stratigraphic interpretations exist for the inverted succession exposed in the hanging wall of the structure. These are based on correlation with two quite separate exposed pelite formations elsewhere. The two formations are lithologically indistinct and unfossiliferous. Here we document the novel use of assayed and logged spectral gamma-ray measurements in comparing the contentious pelite in the hanging wall of the Horn Head Slide to the two possible correlative pelite formations from a wide area of their unequivocal outcrop. The data from the contentious pelite show a clear statistical and stratigraphical affinity with one candidate unit only, thus providing the stratigraphical definition necessary for refining previous cross-sections. A new model, based on our spectral gamma-ray correlation, is proposed to account for the northwestwards directed emplacement of the Lower Falcarragh Pelite Formation along the slide. This model requires pre-Caledonian normal faulting as a precursor to the ensuing compressional event in which stratigraphically younger rocks were thrust over older, a common instance in fold and thrust belt geometry. Our work suggests that spectral gamma-ray measurements may provide a rapid, field-based method for differentiating unfossiliferous pelite or mudstone units at outcrop and in geophysical well-logs, even in structurally complex areas.

A new albulid fish, Phosphonatator oxyrhynchus, based on a single large neurocranium, is described from the deposits of the Ouled Abdoun phosphatic basin, Morocco. The matrix of the fossil contains an elasmobranch assemblage indicating a Danian age (with some redeposited Maastrichtian elements). P. oxyrhynchus is characterized notably by its elongated snout and by a reduced patch of teeth on the parasphenoid. Up to now, fossil fishes from the Ouled Abdoun phosphatic basin were mainly known by isolated remains, and the recovery of this specimen should be ranked equal to the recent discovery of important, very well-preserved new material of vertebrates in the Sidi Daoui area.

It is argued that there is overwhelming evidence from a good graptolite record that the earliest club mosses on Earth were of Gorstian (Ludlow, Silurian) age, and that Baragwanathia longifolia Lang & Cookson and its associated flora persisted through the Přídolí and into the early Devonian, showing some changes during this time.

More than 190 articulate brachiopods from Turonian sections in northwestern Germany and southern England were studied for their stable carbon and oxygen isotopic composition, and some of them for their elemental composition. Most of the brachiopod shells are well preserved, and oxygen isotope composition reflects the temperate conditions of the European epicontinental sea. Upper Turonian mean δ18O values from Lower Saxony and southern England show bottom-water temperatures in the range of 14.2 to 18.2 °C (δ18Ow = −1.5‰ SMOW for an ice-free world). The relative trend of mean brachiopod oxygen and carbon isotopes shows a short-term (200 k.y.) increase in the mid-Upper Turonian horizons that confirms the climate cooling (∼ 2 °C) observed in bulk-rock samples at different sites in Europe. Interbasinal comparisons between England and Germany show similar δ13C values in both basins, whereas oxygen isotopes are heavier in northwestern Germany than in England, suggesting a cool-water influence from the North Sea basin and temperate conditions in the Anglo-Paris basin.