Mössbauer Study of Sedimentary Rocks from King George Island, Antarctica

Abstract

The separation of continents at the periphery of Antarctica occurred about 180 ma ago due to volcanic activity. Geological faults can be very important in the study of geological occurrences. Such geological faults occur across the Admiralty Bay, King George Island, and have been studied in detail previously. Controversial statements were given in earlier works, based on conventional geological investigations, as to whether altered “Jurassic” and unaltered Tertiary rocks were separated by a major fault which goes across the Admiralty Bay, or whether there is no difference in the alteration of the rocks located at either side of the fault. The aim of our work is to investigate rock samples from the Admiralty Bay of King George Island, Antarctica, from different locations on both sides of the geological fault. For these investigations 57Fe Mossbauer spectroscopy and X-ray diffractometry were used. We have found that the phase composition, and the iron distribution among the crystallographic sites of iron-bearing minerals, are characteristic of the location of the rock samples from the Admiralty Bay of King George Island. There is a much higher amount of iron oxides in the rocks from the south part of the geological fault than in the north part. The differences in the mineral composition and iron distribution showed that the rocks in the southern part of the geological fault of King George Island are significantly altered compared to the rocks in the northern part. Our present results support and complement well the results obtained earlier on soils from King George Island.