Abstract The Cantabrian Zone, in the Variscan belt of Western Europe, has one of the most continuous Ediacaran–Paleozoic stratigraphic successions in the world. This succession has been extensively studied, including several detrital zircon U–Pb geochronological studies on 30 samples spanning the aforementioned time slice. In this work, we present data from three new samples covering previously unsampled time-slices and perform multidimensional analysis on the 33 samples in order to quantify the similarity/dissimilarity among all of them with the aim of detecting potential changes in source areas through time and the role of recycling. The results indicate a continuous source of sediments from Ediacaran to late Devonian times punctuated by a sudden ephemeral change in the Early Cambrian that can be attributed to local causes during the inception of the Paleozoic passive margin.

ABSTRACT The Madre de Dios Basin, located in the northern sub-Andean zone of Bolivia is an underexplored sub-Andean basin. A complete stratigraphic revision, including biostratigraphy, core description, and sismo-stratigraphy, has been carried out; it suggests some changes in the historical sedimentary models and allows the identification of several reservoir and seal pairs. This revision not only integrates the results of previous studies but also provides new and original interpretations of the existing data set. The geochemical study indicates the existence of an Upper Devonian world-class source rock, in which, the Frasnian interval is characterized with a type I-II kerogen and a source potential index (SPI) higher than 6 ton/m 2 ; the Famennian interval has a type II kerogen and its SPI reaches 3 t/m 2 . The Carboniferous and Permian formations have levels with notable content of organic matter but do not classify as source rock in this area because of their low SPI. To evaluate the hydrocarbon potential of the basin, a 3-D dynamic model has been built. The thermal calibration of the temperature and maturity data is only possible taking into account an increase of the heat flow during Triassic–Jurassic time. As a consequence, 90% of the hydrocarbons are expelled before Cretaceous times by the identified kitchen in the center of the basin. The remaining 10% were expelled between the Oligocene and present time. Considering a petroleum system yield of 1%, the yet to find (mean) of the studied area is evaluated at 7 Gbbl of oil equivalent. The main challenge of the basin remains in finding traps.