Paraná Basin
The Paraná Basin is a large sedimentary basin situated in the central-eastern part of South America. About 75% of its areal distribution occurs in Brazil, from Mato Grosso to Rio Grande do Sul states. The remainder area is distributed in eastern Paraguay, northeastern Argentina and northern Uruguay. The shape of the depression is roughly elliptical and covers an area of about 1,500,000 km2 (580,000 sq mi).
The Paraná River, from which the Paraná Basin derived its name, flows along the central axis of the Paraná Basin and drains it.
The first study on the Brazilian side of the Paraná Basin dates from 1841, when a Brazilian Imperial Government Mission prospected for coal. Turning point in the basin's geological understanding was the "White Report", published in 1908 by the American geologist Israel C. White, head of the "Comissão de Estudos das Minas de Carvão de Pedra do Brasil" (Commission for Studies on Brazilian Coal Mines). One of the main results of these studies, besides the reconnaissance for coal, was the discovery of Mesosaurus fossils within Permian black shales (Irati Formation), and the Glossopteris flora within the Permian coals. White was one of the first to propose the equivalence between the South American Permian strata and similar rocks of the Karoo Basin in South Africa.
The basin developed during the Paleozoic and the Mesozoic with a sedimentary record comprising rocks from the Ordovician right up to the Cretaceous, thus spanning the time interval between 460 and 66 million years. The maximum thickness of the infill reaches 7,000 m in its central area and is composed of sedimentary and igneous rocks. The sedimentary cover extends across various Precambrian geologic provinces: the Río de la Plata Craton, the Mantiqueira Province, the Luis Alves craton fragment, the Tocantins Province and the Paranapanema block. This last province is distinct in that it is wholly covered be basin sediments and therefore poorly known.
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