Imageamento digital de paleocavernas colapsadas com georadar

In this study, the methodological procedures involved in digital imaging of collapsed paleocaves in tufa using GPR are presented. These carbonate deposits occur in the Quixeré region, Ceará State (NE Brazil), on the western border of the Potiguar Basin. Collapsed paleocaves are exposed along a state road, which were selected to this study. We chose a portion of the called Quixeré outcrop for making a photomosaic and caring out a GPR test section to compare and parameterize the karst geometries on the geophysical line. The results were satisfactory and led to the adoption of criteria for the interpretation of others GPR sections acquired in the region of the Quixeré outcrop. Two grids of GPR lines were acquired; the first one was wider and more spaced and guided the location of the second grid, denser and located in the southern part of the outcrop. The radargrams of the second grid reveal satisfactorily the collapsed paleocaves geometries. For each grid has been developed a digital solid model of the Quixeré outcrop. The first model allows the recognition of the general distribution and location of collapsed paleocaves in tufa deposits, while the second more detailed digital model provides not only the 3D individualization of the major paleocaves, but also the estimation of their respective volumes. The digital solid models are presented here as a new frontier in the study of analog outcrops to reservoirs (for groundwater and hydrocarbon), in which the volumetric parameterization and characterization of geological bodies become essential for composing the databases, which together with petrophysical properties information, are used in more realistic computer simulations for sedimentary reservoirs.

Pirometamorfismo nos arenitos da Formação Açu, Bacia Potiguar, NE do Brasil

Pyrometamorphism results from conditions of high temperatures and very low pressures provoked by the intrusion of hypabyssal basic bodies into sedimentary or metassedimentary hosting rocks. The onshore portion of the Potiguar Basin in NE Brazil offers examples of this type of metamorphism nearby the contacts of Paleogene to Neogene plugs, sills and dikes of diabases and basalts crosscutting sandstones, siltstones and shales of the Açu Formation (Albian-Cenomanian). The thermal effects over these rocks are reflected on textures and minerals assemblages that characterize the sanidinite facies of metamorphism, often with partial melting of the feldspathic and mica-rich matrix. The liquid formed is potassic and peraluminous, with variably colored rhyolitic glass (colorless, yellow, brown) comprising microcrystals of tridymite, sanidine and clinoenstatite, besides residual detrital clasts of quartz and rarely zircon, staurolite and garnet. Lenses of shale intercalated within the sandstones display crystallites of Fe-cordierite (sekaninaite), mullite, sanidine, armalcolite (Fe-Ti oxide) and brown spinel. The rocks formed due to the thermal effect of the intrusions are called buchites for which two types are herein described: a light one derived from feldspathic sandstone and siltstone protoliths; and a dark one derived from black shale protoliths. Textures indicating partial melting and minerals such as sanidine, mullite, tridymite and armalcolite strongly demonstrate that during the intrusion of the basic bodies the temperature reached 1,000-1,150°C, and was followed by quenching. Cooling of the interstitial melts has as consequences the closure of pores and decrease of the permeability of the protolith, which varies from about 17-11% in the unaffected rocks to zero in the thermally modified types. Although observed only at contacts and over small distances, the number of basic intrusions hosted within the Potiguar Basin in both onshore and offshore portions leaves opened the possibility of important implications of the thermal effects over the hydrocarbon exploration in this area as well in other Cretaceous and Paleozoic basins in Brazil

Caracterização e análise do talude continental adjacente à bacia potiguar, NE Brasil

This work presents the results of the first imaging of continental slope adjacent to Potiguar Basin, in the equatorial Brazilian margin (NE Brazil). Swath bathymetry provided a complete coverage of seafloor between the upper and middle slope (100-1,300 m). Fifteen submarine canyons were mapped. The shape of the slope reflects in distinct spatial distribution of the canyons. The western area displays convex profiles which implied a greater amount of incisions by canyons. Some of them have gradient walls higher than 35°. They were classified according to location and morphology. The canyons with heads indenting shelf edge, association with a incised valley and a large fluvial system, high sinuosities, V shape, terraces along margins, further erosive features such as landslide and gullies allow to deduce a sandy-gravelly sedimentation. These canyons are associated with deposition of submarine fan systems that have been considered permeable hydrocarbon reservoirs. The presence of gullies, furrows and dunes demonstrates the role of bottom currents in the shaping of the slope. The enlargement of canyons and the change in the course when they cross the border fault imply that tectonic has also influenced in the morphology of deep waters environments of Potiguar Basin. The current sedimentation of continental slope is considered mixed because the sediments are composed of siliciclastics and bioclasts. Predominant siliciclastics are calcite, dolomite, quartz, and clay minerals. The presence of stable minerals (zircon, tourmaline and rutile), and fragmented bioclasts implies the contributions of Rivers Açu and Apodi