Ordovician Marine Environment Biomarker and Microfossil Data from the Canning Basin

Five borehole cores from the Goldwyer Formation in Western Australia's Canning Basin were analyzed using palynological, petrographic, molecular, and stable isotopic methods. The study focuses on the Middle Ordovician period, detecting two major transgression events and identifying the oldest cryptospores in Australia. This research was contributed by Geoscience Australia Data and was last updated on 2026-04-20.

Use Cases

• Modeling ancient marine anoxic conditions based on Pristane/Phytane ratios and biomarker indices.
• Analyzing microbial community shifts during the Ordovician period using 3-methylhopane indices and specific biosignatures.
• Tracing early land plant evolution based on the identification of cryptospores and terrestrial biomarkers like retene.
• Correlating depositional environments with fossil records of acritarchs, chitinozoans, conodonts, and graptolites.

Strengths

• Integrates multi-disciplinary analyses from five distinct boreholes.
• Provides specific biomarker indices (e.g., Pristane/Phytane <1, elevated dibenzothiophene) for environmental inference.
• Identifies the oldest record of land plants (cryptospores) in Australian Middle Ordovician strata.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Data may reflect geographic bias inherent to the single Canning Basin study area.

Provenance

Source

Geoscience Australia Data

Collection Method

Palynological, petrographic, molecular, and stable isotopic (δ13C of biomarkers) analyses of cores from five boreholes.

Time Range

Middle Ordovician period

Freshness

Last updated 2026-04-20 01:33:17.462804; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Canning Basin, Western Australia