Microfacies and depositional setting of the Upper Triassic mid-oceanic atoll-type carbonates of the Sambosan Accretionary Complex (southern Kyushu, Japan)

The Upper Triassic shallow-water limestones of the Sambosan Accretionary Complex are reconstructed as a remnant of a mid-oceanic atoll-type build-up upon a seamount in the Panthalassan Ocean. The Sambosan atoll-type carbonates and its pedestal were accreted along with deep-water ribbon-chert and related siliceous rocks to the eastern margin of Asia during the Late Jurassic to Early Cretaceous. Studied limestones crop out in southern Kyushu Island, southwest Japan. Although the prevailing and intense deformation during the accretionary process prevents measurement of sections in stratigraphic successions, and sedimentary structures are poorly preserved, microfacies description and foraminifers analysis allow us to speculate the depositional setting of the Sambosan limestones. Seventeen microfacies are distinguished and several foraminifers of Tethyan affinity are identified. Foraminifers indicate a Late Carnian to Rhaetian age. The Tethyan affinity of the macro- and microfaunas suggests that the Sambosan seamount was located presumably in a low- to middle-latitudinal zone of the southern hemisphere during the Late Triassic.