The Eureka Spurs () are several rock spurs exposed along the east side of the head of Mariner Glacier, southwest of Mount McCarthy, in

Victoria Land Victoria Land is a region in eastern Antarctica which fronts the western side of the Ross Sea and the Ross Ice Shelf, extending southward from about 70°30'S to 78th parallel south, 78°00'S, and westward from the Ross Sea to the edge of the Ant ...

. They were so named, after the

ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...

word

eureka Eureka often refers to: * Eureka (word), a famous exclamation attributed to Archimedes * Eureka effect, the sudden, unexpected realization of the solution to a problem Eureka or Ureka may also refer to: History * Eureka Rebellion, an 1854 g ...

, by the

Victoria University of Wellington Antarctic Expedition The Antarctic Research Centre (ARC) is part of the School of Geography, Environment and Earth Sciences at Victoria University of Wellington. Its mission is to research " Antarctic climate history and processes, and their influence on the global cl ...

field party to Evans Neve, 1971–72, on the occasion of fossil discoveries made in the area. Thick sections of

sedimentary Sedimentary rocks are types of rock formed by the cementation of sediments—i.e. particles made of minerals (geological detritus) or organic matter (biological detritus)—that have been accumulated or deposited at Earth's surface. Sedime ...

strata In geology and related fields, a stratum (: strata) is a layer of Rock (geology), rock or sediment characterized by certain Lithology, lithologic properties or attributes that distinguish it from adjacent layers from which it is separated by v ...

of the Spurs Formation are exposed in Eureka Spurs. These outcrops exposed Cambrian submarine channel-fills in the Spurs Formation that exhibit unique meter-scale sedimentary cyclic layers of

breccia Breccia ( , ; ) is a rock composed of large angular broken fragments of minerals or Rock (geology), rocks cementation (geology), cemented together by a fine-grained matrix (geology), matrix. The word has its origins in the Italian language ...

and

diamictite Diamictite (; from Ancient Greek (): 'through' and (): 'mixed') is a type of lithified sedimentary rock that consists of nonsorted to poorly sorted terrigenous sediment containing particles that range in size from clay to boulders, suspended ...

.Kim, Y.H.G., Woo, J., Park, T.Y.S., Kihm, J.H., Lee, J.I. and Choe, M.Y., 2018. ''Sedimentary breccia and diamictite of the Cambrian Spurs Formation in northern Victoria Land, Antarctica: two kinds of debris flows in a submarine channel system'' ''Antarctic Science'', 30(4), pp.245-263. In addition, these outcrops have yielded rare, identifiable fossils, including trilobites, that typically are absent in lower

Paleozoic The Paleozoic ( , , ; or Palaeozoic) Era is the first of three Era (geology), geological eras of the Phanerozoic Eon. Beginning 538.8 million years ago (Ma), it succeeds the Neoproterozoic (the last era of the Proterozoic Eon) and ends 251.9 Ma a ...

sedimentary strata in Victoria Land.Jago, J.B., Bentley, C.J. and Cooper, R.A., 2019. ''Cambrian biostratigraphy of the Bowers back-arc basin, Northern Victoria Land, Antarctica—A review.'' ''Palaeoworld'', 28(3), pp.276-288.

References

Paleontological sites of Antarctica Ridges of Victoria Land Borchgrevink Coast {{BorchgrevinkCoast-geo-stub

See also

References