Descripción: Considering the high concentration of rock avalanches in the northern part of the Neuquén province of Argentina (36°-38°S and 70°-71°W) and their association with lacustrine basins forming natural dams, their catastrophic collapse seems not to be such a common process as could be expected for these cases. The present work depicts the area immediately affected by the outburst flood corresponding to the Navarrete dam catastrophic collapse (175 × 106 m3), through a sedimentological analysis, generated since the arroyo Colorado was blocked due to a rock avalanche deposit during not well constrained postglacial times. The outburst flood dispersion is initially inferred based on morphological criteria and then determined from a sedimentological analysis of its matrix. Furthermore, the matrix is compared to that of the fluvial terraces, which have been sampled along the arroyo Colorado. This comparison shows that even though differences among them are not so significant through most of the study area, matrix frequency starts to be distinctive from the most distant point of sampling.

Descripción: The Sierras Australes of Buenos Aires are located in the south-west corner Of the Province about 100 km west of Bahia Bianca. On the south-west flank of these hills, younger Palaeozoic sedimentary formations overlie poorly exposed granitic and volcanic basement rocks. Granitic Cerro Colorado outcrops, located 16 km strike to the south of the town of San Martin de Tours, and near Lago Los Chilenos, have been included in this broadly interpreted "basement" in many previous geological studies. This contribution is mainly based on detailed structural mapping of the cerro Colorado area, and systematic sampling of granitic and sedimentary rocks for petrographical, microtectonic and Rb/Sr isotopic age analysis. In contrast to previous studies, two Phanerozoic granitic units have been recognised and mapped in the cerro Colorado area of Sierras Australes. The older one, the Cerro Colorado Granite (CO, is composed of foliated and sheared anisotropic granitic rocks with a Rb/Sr isochron age of 381±9 Ma (ir= 0.7035 ). The younger one, Los Chilenos Granite (LCh), consists of isotropic granophiric microgranite with a Rb/Sr isochron age of 140 ±14 Ma (ir= 0.7126). This granite has intrusive contacts with both, the folded quartzite of the Mascota Formation and Cerro Colorado Granite (CC).The older tectomagmatic event (CO is correlated with the compressive Chanica Orogeny, which was associated in the Sierras Australes region, with the eruption of La Mascota - La Hermita rhyolites (360±21 Ma) and the unconformity between Lolén Formation (Middle Devonian) and Sauce Grande Formation (Carboniferous).The younger intrusive event of Los Chilenos Granite (LCh) is considered to be associated with an extensional tectonic regime during the Late Jurassic initial rifting of the Atlantic Ocean. O 1999 Asociación Gcológica.

Descripción: Los Chilenos granite: a new Jurassic granite unit in Cerro Colorado, Sierras Australes de Buenos Aires. Tectonic implication. The Sierras Australes of Buenos Aires are located in the south-west corner of the Province about 100 km west of Bahia Blanca. On the south-west flank of these hills, younger Palaeozoic sedimentary formations overlie poorly exposed granitic and volcanic basement rocks. Granitic Cerro Colorado outcrops, located 16 km strike to the south of the town of San Martin de Tours, and near Lago Los Chilenos, have been included in this broadly interpreted "basement" in many previous geological studies. This contribution is mainly based on detailed structural mapping of the cerro Colorado area, and systematic sampling of granitic and sedimentary rocks for petrographical, microtectonic and Rb/Sr isotopic age analysis. In contrast to previous studies, two Phanerozoic granitic units have been recognised and mapped in the cerro Colorado area of Sierras Australes. The older one, the Cerro Colorado Granite (CC), is composed of foliated and sheared anisotropic granitic rocks with a Rb/Sr isochron age of 381±9 Ma (ir= 0.7035). The younger one, Los Chilenos Granite (LCh), consists of isotropic granophiric microgranite with a Rb/Sr isochron age of 140 ± 14 Ma (ir= 0.7126). This granite has intrusive contacts with both, the folded quartzite of the Mascota Formation and Cerro Colorado Granite (CC).The older tectomagmatic event (CC) is correlated with the compressive Chañica Orogeny, which was associated in the Sierras Australes region, with the eruption of La Mascota - La Hermita rhyolites (360±21 Ma) and the unconformity between Lolén Formation (Middle Devonian) and Sauce Grande Formation (Carboniferous).The younger intrusive event of Los Chilenos Granite (LCh) is considered to be associated with an extensional tectonic regime during the Late Jurassic initial rifting of the Atlantic Ocean. © 1999 Asociación Geológica Argentina.

Descripción: Triassic clastic and volcanic rocks from the Precordillera were deposited in the Cuyana rift basin filling half-graben systems. Contractional/transpressional Andean tectonics leads to the almost complete inversion of some portions of the basin which resulted in present-day isolated, structurally controlled outcrops of these Triassic rocks. In the Southern Precordillera both the degree of Neogene tectonic inversion and structural compexities are variable. At the regional scale, these variations in Andean deformation are related to first order anisotropies like the Cuyana basin borders and previous shear zones of Permian age (San Rafael orogenic phase). This paper focuses on the kinematic analysis done in the Cerro Manantial thrust sheet area (Cordón San Bartolo, central sector of the South Precordillera) where tectonic inversion was not that strong and the influence of oblique strain zones is practically null. Four sets of extensional/ transtensional faults were recognized affecting Triassic sedimentary rocks of the El Cielo Formation (Uspallata Group) at the Quebrada El Salto. Fault displacements are of decimetric to metric scale. Mesoscopic kinematic indicators (en-échèlon tensional gashes, Riedel shear fractures, sigmoidal fractures) were measured. Once Andean deformation was restored, a NNE direction for the Triassic extension was determined. Considering a northern branch of the Cuyana basin trending NNW (Az. 150°) and oblique to the direction of extension (Az. 35-40°), a sinistral strike-slip component could be inferred for this portion of the basin.

Descripción: A continental sequence of red beds and interbedded basaltic layers crops out in the Sierra Chica of Cordoba Province, Argentina (31.5°S, 64.4°W). This succession was deposited in a half-graben basin during the Early Cretaceous. We have carried out a palaeomagnetic survey on outcrops of this basin (147 sites in seven localities). From an analysis of IRM acquisition curves and detailed demagnetization behaviour, three different magnetic components are identified in the volcanic rocks: components A, B and X are carried by single- or pseudo-single-domain (titano) magnetite, haematite and multidomain magnetite, respectively. Component A is interpreted as a primary component of magnetization because it passes conglomerate, contact, tilt and reversal tests. The carrier of the primary magnetization, fine-grained (titano) magnetite, is present in basalts with a high degree of deuteric oxidation. This kind of oxidation is interpreted to have occurred during cooling. Components B and X are discarded because they are interpreted as recent magnetizations. In the sedimentary rocks, haematite and magnetite are identified as the carriers of remanence. Both minerals carry the same component, which passes a reversal test. The calculated palaeomagnetic pole, based on 55 sites, is Lat. 86.0°S, Long. 75.9°E (A95=3.3, K=35). This palaeomagnetic pole supersedes four with anomalous positions reported in previous papers.

Descripción: In the cliffs of the Ladrillero cape, situated on the Atlantic coast of the Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego, the uppermost records of the Austral or Magallanes foreland basin infill crop out. This locality contains Lower Miocene deposits informally named "Cabo Ladrillero beds" and "Cabo San Pablo beds" being the "upper Cabo Ladrillero beds" analyzed in this paper. This locality is situated around ten kilometers to the north of the emerging orogenic front (Punta Gruesa locality) where four facies association have been defined from gravitationally-driven supra batial to prograding and shallowing upward deltaic wedges. Deformed and massive beds by liquefaction processes and resedimentation are connected with abundant clastic dykes and synsedimentary faults. The statistic study suggests they are associated tectonic activity related to a transtensive episode rather than tectonic quiescence sometimes suggested in previous works. We conclude that microfossils documented in the area and used as a tool to support a deep marine environment are situated in underlying stratigraphic intervals that form part of the Desdémona Formation and the "lower Cabo Ladrillero beds" cropping out to the south of the study area. Sedimentological evidence are not conclusive respect to the batimetry but absence of classical turbidites, hyperpycnal flows and abundant deformed and resedimented deposits are more compatible with deltaic deposits, with high detritus supply generating unstable slopes rather than deep marine depositional settings, suggesting a more complex depositional evolution than the foraminiferal-based framework dominant in the literature.

Descripción: A 25 m thick, rhythmic, limestone-marl alternation of Los Catutos Member (Vaca Muerta Formation, Neuquén Basin), was studied bed by hed in several quarries near Zapala. Beds up to 1 m thick are of massive or laminated, lithographic, fossiliferous limestone, locally mottled or weakly bioturbated (?Chondrites), interbedded with thinner marl beds. Limestones and marls can be classified as pelbiomicrites and biopelmicrites, mainly composed of pellets, radiolaria, forams, ostracods, equinoids, spicles of sponges and gastropods, with minor amounts of peloids, feldspar, chert, muscovite, glauconite and phosphates. Values for δ18O and δ13C are similar to those of lithographic limestones from the northern hemisphere. δ13O values are most probably result of diagenetic modification of the primary signal but the δ13C agrees well with the published curves for the Tithonian sea water and with other records from Tethyan limestones. A preliminary analysis of negative excursions of δ13C point to productivity crisis in the sedimentary system with a periodicity of 400 ka, which can be a result of changes in the orbital eccentricity of the earth. Smectite and interlayers reflect pedogenic processes developed on volcanogenic source-rocks, whereas more abundant kaolinite in marls might reflect more humid conditions. With TOC up to 1.95% the rocks offer prospects as a regular to good source rock for hydrocarbons, although thermally immature. A low-energy, dysaerobic, open-marine environment is inferred for Los Catutos Member, with high sedimentation rates as a result of high productivity at the sea-surface and incoming plumes of suspended sediment from the inner shelf. Sediment accumulation in wide and gently dipping calcareous bulges in an outer ramp system is envisaged.

Descripción: This paper deals with the sedimentological characteristics of piedmont deposits exposed in intramontane basins of the Precordillera. Detailed studies carried out along the upper Jáchal river and in the Gualilán area allowed identifying and characterizing six major types of piedmont accumulations: 1) talus, 2) colluvial fans dominated by gravity flows, 3) colluvial fans dominated by fluid flows, 4) collector-conoid fluvial system, 5) piedmonts dominated by channalized flows and 6) alluvial fans. The talus deposits are characterized by the dominance of clast-supported breccias (bearing minimum matrix amounts) that commonly exhibit massive bedding, planar or high angle imbricated clasts fabric. Colluvial fans dominated by gravity flows are formed by massive matrix-supported breccias with minor percentages of clast-supported breccias. On the contrary, colluvial fans dominated by fluid flows are composed of amalgamated channels infilled by both clast- and matrix-supported breccias together with intercalation of graded breccias. Accumulations of the collector-conoid fluvial systems are the most diverse in composition, including from massive matrix-supported breccias to cross-bedded conglomerates and scarce mudstones. In relation to the piedmont dominated by channalized flows, they comprise massive clast-supported breccias and less amounts of imbricated or cross-bedded ones. The alluvial fan deposits are mostly composed of cross-bedded clast-supported conglomerates, though matrix-supported conglomerates and breccias also appear as proximal deposits. Different from the previously mentioned deposits, the clast of alluvial fan accumulations shows more varied lithologic composition. The comparative analysis of the piedmonts found in the studied valleys permits to propone a conceptual model for classification of piedmont, on the basis of the extension of the basins and vertical space of accommodation.