Subsidence and drowning of a carbonate platform in south-central Mongolia (Gobi Altai region) during the late Eifelian to early Givetian: A synthesis of conodont data, magnetic susceptibility, and paleoecology

摘要

New and published stratigraphic data are integrated herein to resolve the age and depositional setting of Middle Devonian strata in the Gobi-Altai Terrane of south-central Mongolia (Bayanhongar Province). The Tsagaankhaalga Formation (Emsian?-Eifelian) is composed primarily of tabular sandy carbonates; it is sharply overlain by dark, fine-grained volcanoclastic marine sedimentary rock of the Govialtai Formation (Givetian), which is comparatively unfossiliferous, except for sporadic, fossiliferous carbonate interbeds. The latter unit contains abundant tentaculites as well as a newly recovered collection of conodonts assigned to the lower Givetian varcus Zone (timorensis, rhenana, or ansatus). A positive shift in bulk magnetic susceptibility coincides with the Tsagaankhaalga/Govialtai contact, and elevated values within the Govialtai correspond to tuffaceous and rhyolitic strata.