T219 130 Years of Research in the Turkana Basin, Kenya: Insights into Earth, Climate, and Life in Eastern Africa Topical Session

Tuesday, 24 September 2024
1:30 PM - 5:30 PM
207A

DEEP DRILLING IN THE TURKANA BASIN PROJECT: EXPLORING THE LINK BETWEEN ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS AND HOMININ EVOLUTION OVER THE PAST 4 MYR

Paper number: T219-10
Program: Technical Sessions
Time: 3:35 PM – 3:50 PM

Authors

Abstract

Scientific drill cores provide unique windows into geologic processes past and present. In the dynamic tectonic, environmental, climatic, and ecological setting of eastern Africa, these records enable us to examine change through time in unprecedented ways. Cores from the East African Rift System provide valuable information about the context in which hominins evolved. The Turkana Basin in northern Kenya provides an unparalleled opportunity to understand our origins due to its remarkably rich fossil record, which has been intensely studied for over six decades. Building upon extensive outcrop records, drilling will allow more complete and systematic sampling of sediment proxies shielded from major diagenetic effects and complex lateral facies variation.

The Deep Drilling in the Turkana Basin (DDTB) project seeks to explore the impact of several types of evolution (tectonic, climatic, biological) on ecosystems and environments. This project will provide insight into the sequence and significance of climate and environmental change in this key locality. It will help constrain the paleoenvironmental and paleoclimatic context of our hominin ancestors, while addressing fundamental questions about past climatic dynamics, basin evolution, tectonics and magmatism, and how the paleorecord can inform our understanding of Earth system dynamics into the future.

A workshop held in Nairobi, Kenya, in July 2022 concluded that the best approach to acquire the target record is through a 2-phase drilling project: Phase 1 being a land-based transect of four 400 m overlapping cores from West Turkana, spanning the interval between 4 Ma to Middle/Late Pleistocene (<0.7 Ma), and Phase 2 as a lake-based core targeting the interval between ~0.7 Ma to present from the Central Basin of Lake Turkana. Proposed drill sites are strategically located based on seismic characterization, overlap requirements, and facies character. The proposed core transect will provide unparallelled access to a record spanning the past 4 Myr.

Geological Society of America Abstracts with Programs. Vol. 56, No. 5

doi: 10.1130/abs/2024AM-403242

© Copyright 2024 The Geological Society of America (GSA), all rights reserved. Permission is hereby granted to the author(s) of this abstract to reproduce and distribute it freely, for noncommercial purposes. Permission is hereby granted to any individual scientist to download a single copy of this electronic file and reproduce up to 20 paper copies for noncommercial purposes advancing science and education, including classroom use, providing all reproductions include the complete content shown here, including the author information. All other forms of reproduction and/or transmittal are prohibited without written permission from GSA Copyright Permissions.