Abstract Cyclothems are stratigraphic sequences deposited during glacial-eustatic transgressive–regressive inundations of land. Major cyclothems are most complete on lower shelves and become separated by exposure surfaces higher on the shelf. Minor cyclothems extend only onto lower shelves or are parasequences reflecting a reversal of sea level during general phases of transgression or regression. In Midcontinent North America, highstand condensed intervals of major cyclothems are conodont-rich black shales correlated eastwards into the Illinois and Appalachian basins. The number of cyclothems decreased by loss of lesser cyclothems across these basins, signifying an eastwards increase in their depositional elevations. Generalized palaeogeographical maps show that facies successions developed across these basins during a single major interglacial transgression and regression. The control of glacial eustasy by the interaction of Earth's orbital parameters, along with radiometric dating, allows subdivision of the cyclothem succession into c. 400 kyr groupings, which reflect the longest eccentricity cycle and facilitates global correlation. Delineation of the basinward extents of regression from the disappearance of exposure surfaces elucidates the history of basin-margin development. Major cyclothems that underwent reversals of general sea-level trend display ‘splays’ of lesser cycles onto the higher shelf. Geochemical cycles ‘nested’ within deepest-water shales on low shelves appear as thin nearshore facies between exposure surfaces at their high-shelf shorelines.

Abstract Ordovician strata in Greenland are extensively exposed in North Greenland and northern East Greenland; additional small traces (loose blocks) are recorded from the craton of West Greenland. The western North Greenland succession is nearly identical to that of the Franklinian Basin exposed on Ellesmere Island, Arctic Canada; the eastern North Greenland represents the (present) northeastern corner of Laurentia and provides the connection to the East Greenland Caledonian platform. The northern East Greenland succession is the natural northern extension of the Caledonian platform of northern Europe and the Appalachian platform of eastern North America. During the Ordovician Greenland occupied a palaeogeographical subtropical to tropical position with a faunal assemblage typical of Laurentia. A prominent faunal peak of diversification occurred in the Late Ordovician. The stratigraphical succession of Greenland is summarized and age relationships are discussed with reference to the fossil faunas and breaks in the successions and correlation between the locations and regions are provided.

ABSTRACT Neoproterozoic to Cambrian isolation of Laurentia during the breakup of Rodinia was associated with multiple large igneous provinces, protracted multiphase rifting, and variable subsidence histories along different margin segments. In this contribution, we develop a paleogeographic model for the Neoproterozoic tectonic evolution of Laurentia based on available stratigraphic, paleomagnetic, petrologic, geochronologic, and thermochronologic data. Early Tonian strata are confined to intracontinental basins in northern Laurentia. Breakup of Rodinia around Laurentia began in earnest with emplacement of the ca. 778 Ma Gunbarrel large igneous province, interpreted to have accompanied separation of the North China block along the Yukon promontory, and onset of localized, intracratonic extension southward along the western margin. Eruption of the ca. 760–740 Ma Mount Rogers volcanic complex along the Southern Appalachian segment of the eastern margin may record extension associated with separation of the Kalahari or South American terranes. At about the same time, the Australia-Mawson blocks began separating from the Sonoran segment of the southern margin and Mojave promontory. Emplacement of the ca. 720 Ma Franklin large igneous province along the northern margin was likely associated with separation of Siberia and was followed by widespread bimodal volcanism and extension along the western margin spanning ca. 720–670 Ma, leading to partial separation of continental fragments, possibly including Tasmania, Zealandia, and Tarim. Emplacement of the ca. 615 Ma Central Iapetus magmatic province along the eastern margin marked rifting that led to separation of Baltica and Amazonia, and partial separation of the Arequipa-Pampia-Antofalla fragments. During the late Ediacaran to Cambrian, the western, northern, eastern, and southern margins all experienced a second episode of local extension and mafic magmatism, including emplacement of the ca. 585 Ma Grenville dikes and ca. 540–532 Ma Wichita large igneous province, leading to final separation of continental fragments and Cambrian rift-drift transitions on each margin. Cryogenian rifting on the western and northern margins and segments of the eastern margin was contemporaneous with low-latitude glaciation. Sturtian and Marinoan glacial deposits and their distinctive ca. 660 Ma and 635 Ma cap carbonates provide important event horizons that are correlated around the western and northern margins. Evidence for Ediacaran glaciation is absent on Laurentia, with the exception of glacial deposits in Scotland, and putative glacial deposits in Virginia, which both formed on the poleward edge of Laurentia. Patterns of exhumation and deposition on the craton display spatial variability, likely controlled by the impingement of mantle plumes associated with mantle upwelling and extensional basin formation during the piecemeal breakup of Rodinia. Glaciation and eustasy were secondary drivers for the distribution of erosion and Neoproterozoic sedimentation on North America.

The stratal architecture of the upper Ely Limestone and Mormon Gap Formation (Pennsylvanian–Lower Permian) in west-central Utah reflects the interaction of icehouse sea-level change and tectonic activity in the distal Antler–Sonoma foreland basin. Nineteen stratigraphic sections correlated by physical and biostratigraphic means provide a basis for tracing Carboniferous–Permian boundary strata over a north–south distance of 60 km. These formations can be subdivided into 14 unconformity-bounded, third-order depositional sequences of differing internal architecture and regional extent. Conodonts and fusulinids provide ages for selected sequences and parasequences, permitting correlation with tectonostratigraphic units in the proximal foreland in north-central Nevada and with selected Midcontinent cyclothems. The 14 third-order sequences stack into three second-order supersequences characterized by distinctive differences in facies and facies stacking patterns, regional continuity of cycles, relative abundance of dolomite and limestone, calculated rock accumulation rates, and the frequency and inferred duration of sequence-bounding hiatuses. These reflect the effect of high-frequency sea-level change on an intermittently subsiding distal foreland shelf. Sediment accommodation was relatively high during the Bashkirian through middle Moscovian (upper part of Lower Absaroka I supersequence) and again during the late Sakmarian and Artinskian (lower part of Lower Absaroka III supersequence) as a function of continuous subsidence and high-amplitude sea-level change. During the late Moscovian through upper Sakmarian (Lower Absaroka II supersequence), however, subsidence slowed or ceased in response to tectonic activity in north-central Nevada, with concomitant development of the West-Central Utah Highlands (forebulge). During this episode of reduced subsidence, intermittent sedimentation was driven by second- and third-order eustatic fluctuations in sea level. Constituent strata form a wedge of onlapping, northward-thinning sequences and parasequences deposited during selected third-order highstands of the Lower Absaroka II second-order sea-level event. Depositional sequences in the distal foreland are bounded by low-relief disconformities of variable duration, in contrast to the angular unconformities and intensely deformed tectonostratigraphic domains that characterize the proximal foreland basin in north-central Nevada.