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- Title
Geochronological investigations using a combination of luminescence and cosmogenic nuclide burial dating of drill cores from the Vienna Basin.
- Authors
Lüthgens, Christopher; Neuhuber, Stephanie; Grupe, Sabine; Payer, Thomas; Peresson, Mandana; Fiebig, Markus
- Abstract
The Vienna Basin area was proven to have been tectonically active throughout the Quaternary until today. This study focuses on investigating the Quaternary depositional history above the Schwechat Deep area, a deep structure rooted in the pre-Neogene basement of the Vienna Basin. In this area, situated in the southeast of the city of Vienna, a typical ~30 m thick sediment succession overlying Miocene fine sediments and comprising two fluvial gravel units, topped, separated, and underlain by sand layers, was detected in a hydrogeological 3D subsurface model. Because the structure of the Schwechat Deep coincides with a depression detected from the topography of the bottom of the gravel units, the question of the tectonic behaviour of the area and possible correlation of the sediments with terrace sediments of the Vienna terrace staircase of the Danube River was raised. To address this question, a scientific drilling was conducted and a 30 m long drill core was recovered for detailed geochronological investigations applying a combination of optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) and terrestrial cosmogenic nuclide (TCN) burial age dating (BAD). Samples for OSL dating were investigated using a post-infrared, infrared stimulated SAR (single aliquot regeneration) protocol at an elevated stimulation temperature of 225 °C (pIRIR225), and 26Al and 10Be were investigated for BAD in order to establish a robust chronology for the sediment succession. Sediment petrographical analyses were conducted to preferably back up the results from the dating techniques. The successful application of the BAD approach provided an age for the lower gravel unit of 2.6-2.9 Ma. This TCN based age is complemented by a minimum age range derived from multiple OSL dating results, including investigations of samples taken from archived drill cores to constrain the relevance of the results for the broader Schwechat Deep area. Results from sediment petrographical analyses and OSL dating suggest a repeated reworking of the upper sedimentary units by the Danube up to the late Holocene and subrecent times. In addition, the results from this study suggest that the Schwechat Deep area has most likely been tectonically stable throughout the Quaternary. However, when comparing the position of presumable correlate sediments documented in the municipal area of Vienna with the position of the sediments dated in this study, the implied displacement confirms the need for further geochronological investigations to decipher the forcing factors that led to the development of the Vienna terrace staircase. For this purpose, the combination of OSL and BAD techniques may provide a powerful tool especially for the dating of sediments from older time slices of the Quaternary.
- Subjects
VIENNA Basin (Austria); GEOLOGICAL time scales; LUMINESCENCE; DRILL cores; FELDSPAR; COSMOGENIC nuclides
- Publication
Journal of Applied & Regional Geology / Zeitschrift der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Geowissenschaften (ZDGG), 2017, Vol 168, Issue 1, p115
- ISSN
1860-1804
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1127/zdgg/2017/0081