The inheritance of a Mesozoic landscape in western Scandinavia

Ola Fredin (), Giulio Viola, Horst Zwingmann, Ronald Sørlie, Marco Brönner, Jan-Erik Lie, Else Margrethe Grandal, Axel Müller, Annina Margreth, Christoph Vogt and Jochen Knies
Additional contact information
Ola Fredin: Geological Survey of Norway
Giulio Viola: Geological Survey of Norway
Horst Zwingmann: Kyoto University, Kitashirakawa Oiwake-cho, 606-8502 Kyoto, Japan
Ronald Sørlie: Lundin Petroleum AS
Marco Brönner: Geological Survey of Norway
Jan-Erik Lie: Lundin Petroleum AS
Else Margrethe Grandal: Lundin Petroleum AS
Axel Müller: Natural History Museum, University of Oslo
Annina Margreth: Geological Survey of Norway
Christoph Vogt: ZEKAM/FB5 Geowissenschaften, University of Bremen
Jochen Knies: Geological Survey of Norway

Nature Communications, 2017, vol. 8, issue 1, 1-11

Abstract: Abstract In-situ weathered bedrock, saprolite, is locally found in Scandinavia, where it is commonly thought to represent pre-Pleistocene weathering possibly associated with landscape formation. The age of weathering, however, remains loosely constrained, which has an impact on existing geological and landscape evolution models and morphotectonic correlations. Here we provide new geochronological evidence that some of the low-altitude basement landforms on- and offshore southwestern Scandinavia are a rejuvenated geomorphological relic from Mesozoic times. K-Ar dating of authigenic, syn-weathering illite from saprolitic remnants constrains original basement exposure in the Late Triassic (221.3±7.0–206.2±4.2 Ma) through deep weathering in a warm climate and subsequent partial mobilization of the saprolitic mantle into the overlying sediment cascade system. The data support the bulk geomorphological development of west Scandinavia coastal basement rocks during the Mesozoic and later, long-lasting relative tectonic stability. Pleistocene glaciations played an additional geomorphological role, selectively stripping the landscape from the Mesozoic overburden and carving glacial landforms down to Plio–Pleistocene times. Saprolite K-Ar dating offers unprecedented possibilities to study past weathering and landscape evolution processes.

Date: 2017
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms14879 Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:8:y:2017:i:1:d:10.1038_ncomms14879

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/ncomms14879

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().