Carbonate Microfabrics is the first attempt to bring together in one reference the application of microfabric analysis to the solution of problems in the fields of geology, geophysics and geotechnique. This book, the result of a symposium and workshop on carbonate microfabrics, explores the relationship of microfabrics to fundamental properties and processes in carbonates. Carbonate Microfabrics will be of particular interest to geologists and is intended to be of general interest to researchers in such related fields as geochemistry, geophysics, and geotechnique.

Carbonate Microfabrics is the first attempt to bring together in one reference the application of microfabric analysis to the solution of problems in the fields of geology, geophysics and geotechnique. This book, the result of a symposium and workshop on carbonate microfabrics, explores the relationship of microfabrics to fundamental properties and processes in carbonates. Carbonate Microfabrics will be of particular interest to geologists and is intended to be of general interest to researchers in such related fields as geochemistry, geophysics, and geotechnique.

This unparelleled reference synthesizes the methods used in microfacies analysis and details the potential of microfacies in evaluating depositional environments and diagenetic history, and, in particular, the application of microfacies data in the study of carbonate hydrocarbon reservoirs and the provenance of archaeological materials. Nearly 230 instructive plates (30 in color) showing thin-section photographs with detailed explanations form a central part of the content. Helpful teaching-learning aids include detailed captions for hundreds of microphotographs, boxed summaries of technical terms, many case studies, guidelines for the determination and evaluation of microfacies criteria, for enclosed CD with 14000 references, self-testing exercises for recognition and characterization skills, and more

Microbial carbonates (microbialites) are remarkable sedimentary deposits because they have the longest geological range of any type of biogenic limestones, they form in the greatest range of different sedimentary environments, they oxygenated the Earth’s atmosphere, and they produce and store large volumes of hydrocarbons. This Special Publication provides significant contributions at a pivotal time in our understanding of microbial carbonates, when their economic importance has become established and the results of many research programmes are coming to fruition. It is the first book to focus on the economic aspects of microbialites and in particular the giant pre-salt discoveries offshore Brazil. In addition it contains papers on the processes involved in formation of both modern and ancient microbialites and the diversity of style in microbial carbonate buildups, structures and fabrics in both marine and non-marine settings and throughout the geological record.

"This volume presents current understanding of the mechanisms and environments of the formation of calcretes and palustrine carbonates. Through a series of specific field examples, papers in this volume illustrate the wide variety of potential applications of these types of deposits. The papers presented here cover a wide array of ages and environmental settings of calcrete and palustrine deposition and include many interesting applications, such as the climatic and geomorphic controls on calcrete formation, possible modern analogues for palustrine carbonates, the interplay between palustrine, pedogenic, and diagenetic processes, the utility of radio-isotopic methods for dating pedogenic carbonates, applications to understanding landscape evolution, and reconstruction of diagenetic sequences. The result is a state-of-the-art book on these deposits so common in the geological record and in recent environments."--Publisher's website.

Permeability, the rate at which fluids move through a porous medium, affects the consolidation and reduction in porosity of a sediment with time and overburden pressure. Most marine clays consist of smectites and illites that are fine-grained and platey. In contrast, carbonate sediments are composed of multishaped, multisized components. In general, clay-rich sediments consolidate to lower porosities and are less permeable that carbonates at given overburden pressures. This difference is related to microfabric. Numerous samples recovered from the continental slope to midocean depths were consolidated in the laboratory, and permeabilities were determined directly by using falling head permeameters and indirectly by consolidation theory. In the marine clays, porosity values ranged between 1 x 10(exp-10) cm/s. In contrast, carbonate sediments with porosities between 60 and 40% had permeabilities that ranged between 1 x 10(exp-4) and 1 x 10(exp-7) cm/s. Sediments with varying percentages of carbonate content, but with a matrix of clay particles, fall with in the same range as the clays. At given porosities, permeabilities with in the carbonate sediments are determined by microfabric. For example, grain-supported samples have a higher permeability (1 x 10(exp-4) cm/s) than matrix-supported samples (1 x 10(exp-5) and 1 x 10(exp-6) cm/s). In general, matrix-supported carbonate sediments composed of aragonite needles have higher permeabilities (1 x 10(exp- 5) cm/s) than matrix-supported sediments of low-magnesian calcite composed predominately of coccoliths (1 x 10(exp-6) cm/s). Geoacoustics, Penetration, Sedimentology, Permeability, Penetrometers, Geotechnical properties.