San Rafael Block
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San Rafael Block
The San Rafael Block or San Rafael Massif (Spanish: ''Bloque de San Rafael'' or ''Macizo de San Rafael'') is an uplifted area in central Mendoza Province, Argentina. The San Rafael Block is both a geographic and a tectonic unit. From a tectonostratigraphic view, some geologists consider it an exposure of the Cuyania (Precordillera) terrane being its southern extension. The San Rafael Block crops out to the south of the other exposures of Cuyania. The San Rafael Block forms the northeastern boundary of the Neuquén Basin. See also * North Patagonian Massif The North Patagonian Massif or Somún Cura Massif (Spanish language, Spanish: ''Macizo Norpatagónico'', ''Macizo Nordpatagónico'' or ''Macizo de Somún Cura'') is a massif in northern Patagonia located in the Argentine provinces of Río Negro Pro ... * Reserva Provincial La Payunia * San Rafael orogeny References {{reflist Geology of Mendoza Province Geography of Mendoza Province ...
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Spanish Language
Spanish ( or , Castilian) is a Romance languages, Romance language of the Indo-European language family that evolved from colloquial Latin spoken on the Iberian peninsula. Today, it is a world language, global language with more than 500 million native speakers, mainly in the Americas and Spain. Spanish is the official language of List of countries where Spanish is an official language, 20 countries. It is the world's list of languages by number of native speakers, second-most spoken native language after Mandarin Chinese; the world's list of languages by total number of speakers, fourth-most spoken language overall after English language, English, Mandarin Chinese, and Hindustani language, Hindustani (Hindi-Urdu); and the world's most widely spoken Romance languages, Romance language. The largest population of native speakers is in Mexico. Spanish is part of the Iberian Romance languages, Ibero-Romance group of languages, which evolved from several dialects of Vulgar Latin in I ...
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Mendoza Province
Mendoza, officially Province of Mendoza, is a province of Argentina, in the western central part of the country in the Cuyo region. It borders San Juan to the north, La Pampa and Neuquén to the south, San Luis to the east, and the republic of Chile to the west; the international limit is marked by the Andes mountain range. Its capital city is the homonymous city of Mendoza. Covering an area of 148,827 km2, it is the seventh biggest province of Argentina with 5.35% of the country's total area. The population for 2010 is 1,741,610 inhabitants, which makes it the fourth most populated province of the country, or 4.35% of the total national population. History Pre-Columbian times Archeological studies have determined that the first inhabitants in the area date from the Holocene, but there are few remains of those people to know their habits. The earliest sites of human occupation in Mendoza Province, Agua de la Cueva and Gruta del Indio, are 12,000–13,000 years old. In ...
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Tectonic
Tectonics (; ) are the processes that control the structure and properties of the Earth's crust and its evolution through time. These include the processes of mountain building, the growth and behavior of the strong, old cores of continents known as cratons, and the ways in which the relatively rigid plates that constitute the Earth's outer shell interact with each other. Tectonics also provide a framework for understanding the earthquake and volcanic belts that directly affect much of the global population. Tectonic studies are important as guides for economic geologists searching for fossil fuels and ore deposits of metallic and nonmetallic resources. An understanding of tectonic principles is essential to geomorphologists to explain erosion patterns and other Earth surface features. Main types of tectonic regime Extensional tectonics Extensional tectonics is associated with the stretching and thinning of the crust or the lithosphere. This type of tectonics is found ...
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Tectonostratigraphy
In geology, tectonostratigraphy is stratigraphy that refers either to rock sequences in which large-scale layering is caused by the stacking of thrust sheets, or nappes, in areas of thrust tectonics or to the effects of tectonics on lithostratigraphy. Tectonically formed stratigraphy One example of such a tectonostratigraphy is the Scandinavian Caledonides. Within the entire exposed 1800 km length of this orogenic belt the following sequence is recognised from the base upwards: * Autochthon : undisturbed foreland of the Baltic plate * Parautochthon : thrust sheets that have moved only a short distance (up to 10s of km) from their original position * Lower allochthon : far travelled thrust sheets derived from the Baltic plate passive margin, mainly sediments associated with the break-up of Rodinia * Middle allochthon : also derived from the margin of the Baltic plate, Proterozoic basement and its psammitic cover * Upper allochthon : thrust sheets including island arc and oph ...
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Cuyania
The Precordillera Terrane or Cuyania was an ancient microcontinent or terrane whose history affected many of the older rocks of Cuyo in Argentina. It was separated by oceanic crust from the Chilenia terrane which accreted into it at ~420-390 Ma when Cuyania was already amalgamated with Gondwana. The hypothesized Mejillonia Terrane in the coast of northern Chile is considered by some geologists to be a single block with Cuyania. The San Rafael Block crops out 200 km to the south of the other exposures of Cuyania and is the southern extension of the terrane. The Precordillera has been hypothesised to have been derived from Laurentia, the core of North America, which was attached to the western margin of South America during the Precambrian when virtually all continents formed a "proto-Gondwana" supercontinent known as Pannotia. The Precordillera was then part of a proposed "Texas Plateau", a promontory attached to Laurentia similar to the way the Falkland Plateau is attached to ...
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Precordillera
Precordillera is a Spanish geographical term for hills and mountains lying before a greater range, foothills. The term is derived from ''cordillera'' (mountain range)—literally "pre-mountain range"—and applied usually to the Andes. Some places usually called precordillera are: *Andean mountains east of the main ranges of Andes in Argentina. It is separated from the much higher Frontal Cordillera to the west by Uspallata Valley in Argentina. Precordillera mountains reach around 3,000 m a.s.l. in Sierras de Villavicencio. *Used all over Chile from north to south as a morphological unit lying just between the Andes and the Intermediate Depression The Central Valley ( es, Valle Central), Intermediate Depression, or Longitudinal Valley is the depression between the Chilean Coastal Range and the Andes Mountains. The Chilean Central Valley extends from the border with Peru to Puerto Montt in .... See also * Geological history of the precordillera terrane * References {{Geo-te ...
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Terrane
In geology, a terrane (; in full, a tectonostratigraphic terrane) is a crust fragment formed on a tectonic plate (or broken off from it) and accreted or " sutured" to crust lying on another plate. The crustal block or fragment preserves its own distinctive geologic history, which is different from that of the surrounding areas—hence the term "exotic" terrane. The suture zone between a terrane and the crust it attaches to is usually identifiable as a fault. A sedimentary deposit that buries the contact of the terrane with adjacent rock is called an overlap formation. An igneous intrusion that has intruded and obscured the contact of a terrane with adjacent rock is called a stitching pluton. Older usage of ''terrane'' simply described a series of related rock formations or an area having a preponderance of a particular rock or rock groups. Overview A tectonostratigraphic terrane is not necessarily an independent microplate in origin, since it may not contain the full thickness ...
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Neuquén Basin
Neuquén Basin ( es, Cuenca Neuquina) is a sedimentary basin covering most of Neuquén Province in Argentina. The basin originated in the Jurassic and developed through alternating continental and marine conditions well into the Tertiary. The basin bounds to the west with the Andean Volcanic Belt, to the southeast with the North Patagonian Massif and to the northeast with the San Rafael Block and to the east with the Sierra Pintada System. The basin covers an area of approximately .Howell et al., 2005 One age of the SALMA classification, the Colloncuran, is defined in the basin, based on the Collón Curá Formation, named after the Collón Curá River, a tributary of the Limay River. Description Jurassic and Cretaceous marine transgressions from the Pacific are recorded in the sediments of Neuquén Basin. These marine sediments belong to Cuyo Group, Tordillo Formation, Auquilco Formation and Vaca Muerta. In the Late Cretaceous, conditions in the neighboring Andean orogen ...
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North Patagonian Massif
The North Patagonian Massif or Somún Cura Massif (Spanish language, Spanish: ''Macizo Norpatagónico'', ''Macizo Nordpatagónico'' or ''Macizo de Somún Cura'') is a massif in northern Patagonia located in the Argentine provinces of Río Negro Province, Río Negro and Chubut Province, Chubut. The massif is a plateau surrounded by sedimentary basins. The North Patagonian Massif covers an area of approximately . The massif rises above the surrounding topography reaching a maximum of above sea level. Compared to neighboring areas, the North Patagonian Massif has thicker continental crust. Stratigraphy The massif consists of a basement (geology), basement formed by Cambrian, Cambro-Ordovician rocks, overlain by the Silurian, Middle Silurian Sierra Grande Formation. The early Paleozoic section is covered by metamorphic and igneous complexes; the Permian Pailemán Plutonic Complex, Pailemán and Navarrete Plutonic Complexes,González et al., 2014, p.175 and the unconformably overlyin ...
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Reserva Provincial La Payunia
The Reserva Provincial La Payunia ( es, La Payunia Provincial Reserve) also known as Payún or Payén is a natural reserve located in the Malargüe Department in the southern part of Mendoza Province, Argentina, about 160 km away from Malargüe city. It was declared as nature preserve in 1988 and has an area of 4,500 km2. La Payunia is home to the many volcanic cones, being noteworthy the Payún Matrú volcano. Biodiversity *Flora: The flora is represented by matorrales, prairies, native mountain species and other typical patagonian plants such as ''Adesmia pinifolia'', '' Festuca pallescens'', '' Grindelia chiloensis'', ''Ephedra ochreata miers'', '' Neosparton ephedroides grisebach'', ''Psila spartioides'', ''Prosopis denudans'' (between 500 and 1,300 m AMSL) and '' Schinus poligamun'' and '' Larrea nítida cavanilles'' (between 1,800 and 2,850 m AMSL). *Fauna: Over 70 animal species have been documented on the reserve. Common bird species include the Andean cond ...
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San Rafael Orogeny
The San Rafael orogeny was an orogeny that affected parts of western Argentina and Chile during the Late Paleozoic. The resulting orogenic belt has a NW-NNW curved form. The San Rafael orogeny might have been linked with the roughly contemporary Gondwanide orogeny of eastern Argentina. Parts of the Choiyoi Group sediments were deformed by the San Rafael orogeny. During the Neogene ancient faults related to the San Rafael orogeny conditioned the geometry of the blocks affected by the Andean orogeny. Some of the plutons of the Elqui-Limarí Batholith were emplaced a context of crustal thickening Thrust tectonics or contractional tectonics is concerned with the structures formed by, and the tectonic processes associated with, the shortening and thickening of the crust or lithosphere. It is one of the three main types of tectonic regime, ... derivative of the San Rafael orogeny. References Orogenies of South America Geology of Mendoza Province Geology of Chile Paleozoic oro ...
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Geology Of Mendoza Province
Geology () is a branch of natural science concerned with Earth and other astronomical objects, the features or rocks of which it is composed, and the processes by which they change over time. Modern geology significantly overlaps all other Earth sciences, including hydrology, and so is treated as one major aspect of integrated Earth system science and planetary science. Geology describes the structure of the Earth on and beneath its surface, and the processes that have shaped that structure. It also provides tools to determine the relative and absolute ages of rocks found in a given location, and also to describe the histories of those rocks. By combining these tools, geologists are able to chronicle the geological history of the Earth as a whole, and also to demonstrate the age of the Earth. Geology provides the primary evidence for plate tectonics, the evolutionary history of life, and the Earth's past climates. Geologists broadly study the properties and processes of Ea ...
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