Barberton Archean Surface Environments, Moodies Group, Barberton Greenstone Belt
Project Acronym: BASE | State: Completed | Expedition ID: 5069
Sedimentary rocks of the Moodies Group in the Barberton Greenstone Belt (BGB), South Africa, are about 3.22 Ga old and represent some of the world’s oldest well-preserved shallow-water strata. They reach almost 4 km in stratigraphic thickness, are lithologically variable and were deposited within ca. 1 to 14 Ma. The metamorphic grade is lower greenschist-facies; widespread early-diagenetic silicification preserved micro- and macrotextures virtually without strain.
Moodies strata represent a very-high-magnification record of Archean surface processes and are probably unique worldwide in allowing the regional and temporal contextualization of micro-scale and high-resolution Archean analytical data, comparable or superior to similar strata in Australia’s Pilbara region. Their coastal depositional environment is ideal to investigate and combine data from both marine and terrestrial settings.
Keywords: Africa, South Africa, Barberton, Early Life Ecology, Greenstone Belt, Moodies, Ocean And Atmosphere, Oxygen
Working halves are stored at Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources, Spandau, Germany
Archive halves are stored at CGS, National Core Library, Donkerhoek, South Africa
Project Management
Contact Person
Lead PIs
- Nicolas Beukes – University of Johannesburg
- Martin Homann – University College London
- Emmanuelle Javaux – Universite de Liege
- Takeshi Kakegawa – Tohoku University
- Martin van Kranendonk – University of New South Wales
- Stefan Lalonde – Institut Universitaire Europeen de la Mer
- Johanna Marin-Carbonne – Universite de Lausanne
- Paul Mason – University of Utrecht
- Michael Tice – Texas A&M University
CoPIs
Co-PIs: No data found
Project Details
Project Description
- Title:
- Barberton Archean Surface Environments (BASE), Moodies Group, Barberton Greenstone Belt (BASE)
- Proposed in:
- 2019
- Current State:
- Completed
- Proposal abstract:
- n.a.
- Geologic age:
- Archean
- Number of drillsites (drillholes):
- 5(8)
- Drilled length:
- 3135.22 m (8 wellholes/hole attempts/hole deepenings/sidetracks total)
- Cored length:
- 2979.64 m
- Core recovered, length:
- 2903.25 m
- Core recovered length / Cored length:
- 97.4%
- Core recovered / Drilled length:
- 92.6%
- Expedition #
- 5069
- Location
- Barberton, South Africa
- Coordinates
- -25.7340, 31.0975
- Status
- Completed
Project Location
Project Timeline
Sampling Party 3
13 - 15 October 2025 at BGR core repository in Berlin
Sampling Party 2
11 - 12 March 2024 at BGR core repository in Berlin
Moratorium
16 September 2023 - 15 September 2025
Sampling Party
11 - 15 September 2023 at BGR core repository in Berlin
Drilling
17 November 2021 - 27 July 2022
Full Proposal Approved
First Full Proposal Submitted
Workshop Held
5 - 10 October 2017 in Barberton, South Africa