Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
A craton is an ancient part of the Earth's continental crust which has been more or less stable since Precambrian times. Cratons whose ancient rocks are widely exposed at the surface, often with relatively subdued relief, are known as shields.
Cratons of South America and Africa during the Triassic Period when the two continents were joined as part of the Pangea supercontinent. A craton (/ ˈ k r eɪ t ɒ n / KRAYT-on, / ˈ k r æ t ɒ n / KRAT-on, or / ˈ k r eɪ t ən / KRAY-tən; [1] [2] [3] from Ancient Greek: κράτος kratos "strength") is an old and stable part of the continental lithosphere, which consists of Earth's two ...
Nevertheless, the oldest cratons on Earth include the Kaapvaal Craton, the Western Gneiss terrane of the Yilgarn Craton (~2.9 – >3.2 Ga), the Pilbara Craton (~3.4 Ga), and portions of the Canadian Shield (~2.4 – >3.6 Ga). Parts of Dharwar Craton in India are greater than 3.0 Ga. The oldest dated rocks of the Baltic Shield are 3.5 Ga old. [10]
The Pilbara and Kaapvaal cratons contain well-preserved Archaean microfossils. Drilling has revealed traces of microbial life and photosynthesis from the Archaean in both Africa and Australia. [19] The oldest widely accepted evidence of photosynthesis by early life forms is molecular fossils found in 2.7 Ga-old shales in the Pilbara Craton.
There are only two locations in the world containing rock formations that are intact enough to preserve evidence of early life: the Kaapvaal Craton in Southern Africa and the Pilbara Craton in Western Australia. [4] The Dresser Formation is located in the Pilbara Craton, and contains sedimentary rock from the Paleoarchean Era.
The Dharwar Craton is an Archean continental crust craton formed between 3.6-2.5 billion years ago , which is located in southern India and considered the oldest part of the Indian peninsula. [ 2 ] Studies in the 2010s suggest that the craton can be separated into three crustal blocks since they show different accretionary history (i.e., the ...
The Slave Craton includes the 4.03 Ga-old Acasta Gneiss which is one of the oldest dated rocks on Earth. [ 1 ] [ 2 ] Covering about 300,000 km 2 (120,000 sq mi), it is a relatively small but well-exposed craton dominated by ~2.73–2.63 Ga (billion years-old) greenstones and turbidite sequences and ~2.72–2.58 Ga plutonic rocks, with large ...
The Montana metasedimentary province and Beartooth–Bighorn magmatic zone were established as cratons by about 3.0–2.8 Ga. Crustal growth occurred through a combination of continental-arc magmatism resulting from oceanic crust subducted beneath continental crust on an adjacent plate, creating an arc-shaped mountain belt, together with ...