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A survey of Australian scientists confirmed that, despite thousands of kilometers away, between the rocks of Tasmania (Australia) and those of Arizona's Grand Canyon (USA), there was old geological link. . The study in question was published in the journal Geology.
As summarized in the Phys.org portal, this happened during the existence of the supercontinent Rodinia 1,100 million years ago, whose configuration has been the subject of scientific debate for more than two decades . The team led by researcher Jacob Mulder discovered a strange similarity between the sedimentary rocks of the Tasmanian Rocky Cape Group and the Unkar group in the Grand Canyon in the southwestern United States. .
Tasmanian rocks baffled scientists because they "did not look like those of the neighboring Mesoproterozoic in Australia," Mulder said. The team decided to badyze the zircon grains, which are a small proportion, to understand where they came from.
The researchers thus established that "the rocks of the Grand Canyon are not alike, are the same age", but "the detrital zircons of the sedimentary rocks of the Grand Canyon also have the same geochemical imprint that the zircons of Mesoproterozoic Tasmanian sequences ", baderted the author of the study
" These various pieces of evidence corroborate the interpretation that Tasmanian sedimentary rocks are part of the same system of Mesoproterozoic basins that are now on display in the Grand Canyon, "said Mulder. "We conclude that, although it is now on the opposite side of the planet, Tasmania must have been linked to the western United States by the Mesoproterozoic," he added.
According to the scientist, the study is important to understand the configuration of Rodinia, that " seems to have discovered the secrets of this supercontinent that have remained a mystery for decades."
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