| Summary: | The Central Cordillera and Eastern Cordillera of the northern Andes form the western and eastern flanks of the north-trending Middle Magdalena Valley basin. Previous estimates for the timing of initial exhumation of the two cordilleras range from ~100 to ~10 Ma. Accurately constraining the spatial and temporal distribution of deformation in Colombia has implications for the shortening history of the Andean convergent margin and the prediction of rapid lateral facies changes in sedimentary basins in close proximity to sediment sources.
This study applies sandstone petrographic point counts, field sedimentological analyses of basin fill, and paleocurrent measurements of trough cross-stratification, clast imbrication, and flute casts to provide new insights into the tectonic history of the flanks of the Middle Magdalena Valley basin. Between the lower and upper Paleocene strata of the Lisama Formation, paleocurrent orientations show a shift from northward to eastward transport. This change in sediment dispersal coincides with a shift from a cratonic (Amazonian) to orogenic (Andean) sediment source, as recorded by published U-Pb detrital zircon geochronological results (Nie et al. 2010), suggesting initial uplift of the Central Cordillera by mid-Paleocene time. Later in the basin’s history, establishment of an alluvial-plain system with meandering-channel deposits is recorded in lower–middle Eocene strata of the lower La Paz Formation.
Consistent eastward paleocurrents characterize mid-Paleocene through uppermost Eocene strata, indicating a continuous influence of western sediment source areas. However, within the upper middle Eocene succession (~40 Ma), at the boundary between the lower and upper La Paz Formation, sandstone compositions show a dramatic decrease in lithic content. This compositional change is accompanied by a facies shift to amalgamated fluvial channels, reflecting changes in both the composition and proximity of the western sediment source. We attribute these changes to the growing influence of the exhumed La Cira/Infantas paleohighs off the western flank of the present-day Nuevo Mundo syncline.
In the uppermost Eocene strata of the Esmeraldas Formation, paleocurrents show a switch to dominantly westward transport that persisted through the Neogene. In addition, deposits show a contemporaneous decrease in the amount of coarse-grained channel deposits. These changes are interpreted to reflect the onset of exhumation in the Eastern Cordillera. The lack of a significant change in sandstone compositions at this boundary suggests a compositional similarity between strata uplifted by the Lisama structure and the Eastern Cordillera. These data support and further refine previous thermochronologic and provenance studies which suggest that uplift-induced exhumation of the Central Cordillera and Eastern Cordillera commenced by mid-Paleocene and late Eocene–early Miocene time, respectively. === text
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