The Silurian of Severnaya Zemlya, Arctic Russia  

Olga K. Bogolepova¹ and Alexander P. Gubanov¹  

¹ Department of Earth Sciences, Uppsala University, Villavägen 16, SE-752 36, Uppsala, Sweden.   E–mail: olga.bogolepova@pal.uu.se / eprobe@geofys.uu.se

Key words: Palaeontology. Palaeogeography. Silurian. Severnaya Zemlya. Russian high Arctic.

In connection with the EUROPROBE programme and a new INTAS project "NEMLOR" (Northern Eurasian Margin and Lomonosov Ridge), the geology of the Russian high Arctic is investigated. We focus on analysis of major variations in biodiversity and changes in biogeographic differentiation along the Eurasian margin during the Early Palaeozoic. Integration of this data with the biofacies and lithofacies database for the region will be undertaken in view of increased precision in stratigraphic correlation and palaeogeographic synthesis. Important implications are predicted as regard relative positioning of crustal blocks, and for inferring geodynamic events during the period between the Rodinia break-up and the Pangea assembly.

The lecture will concentrate on results of recent expeditions to the Severnaya Zemlya Archipelago that reveal new data on the Silurian stratigraphy, facies distribution, palaeontology and palaeogeography of this area. We will discuss:

— the Ordovician – Silurian boundary interval

— an occurrence of black graptolitic shales in the mid Telychian

— a first record of graptolites, the "Bohemian-type" bivalvia, plumulitid machaeridians, myodocope ostracodes etc. and their implication

— an evidence for independent history, and a geographic location of Severnaya Zemlya.

Received: February 15, 2003

Accepted: June 15, 2003