Cambrian skeletal halite crystals and experimental analogues |
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| Authors: | PETER N SOUTHGATE |
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| Institution: | Research School of Earth Sciences, Australian National University, P.O. Box 4, Canberra 2600, Australia |
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| Abstract: | A suite of unusual highly skeletal halite pseudomorphs is described from the lower Middle Cambrian rocks that crop out at Ardmore in the Georgina Basin, northern Australia. The pseudomorphs are preserved as both moulds and casts within a dark and light colour-banded chert. They are orientated parallel to bedding and represent halite crystal growth within a brine pool. Laterally equivalent rocks are characterized by sedimentary textures and structures indicative of periodic emergence and desiccation. Laboratory grown halite crystals are also described and compared with the pseudomorphs from Ardmore. Experimentally produced halite crystals formed from either: (1) brine solutions obtained as residues after organic matter extraction from phosphate rocks, or (2) solutions of NaCI and distilled water. Both pyramidal rafted hoppers and floor nucleated cuboids formed in solutions containing only NaCI and distilled water; whereas in the residue solutions, that contained humic acids, rafted pyramidal forms were absent and crystal nucleation was restricted to the floor of the evaporative dish. As brine depth decreased the halite precipitation rate increased and resulted in a suite of excrescent, highly skeletal crystals that formed as a result of brine evaporation to dryness. The variable crystal morphology depended upon both the brine depth and slope of the evaporative dish floor. Horizontally orientated chevron halite crystals formed where the evaporative dish was inclined and precipitation preferentially occurred on cube faces. Pagoda, reticulate ridge and dendritic forms represent an increasingly skeletal crystal suite characterized by the preferential precipitation of NaCI on cube edges and corners rather than faces. Using the experimentally grown crystals as analogues the pseudomorphs at Ardmore are interpreted as forming in very shallow brine pools that evaporated to dryness. |
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