Paleomagnetism of Lower Paleozoic Terranes in the Northern Appalachians

古地磁研究表明，早古生代北美洲的板块构造表明，北美洲位于赤道古纬度，其阿巴拉契亚边缘朝南。横跨Iapetus洋的是冈瓦纳超大陆和阿瓦隆-阿莫里卡微大陆。该项目的先前工作在Iapetus随后关闭时追踪板和微孔板的位置方面取得了相当大的进展。这次更新将通过支持从可疑地体和邻近北美边缘的岩石序列中收集额外的样本，并完成这些和以前收集的古地磁分析来扩展这项工作。研究结果应能综合Iapetus闭合期间海洋地体的运动历史及其与北美边缘早古生代造山活动的关系。

The early Paleozoic plate configurations, as determined by paleomagnetic investigations, indicates that North America occupied equatorial paleolatitudes with its Appalachian margin facing south. Across the Iapetus Ocean lay the Gondwana super- continent along with the Avalon-Armorica microcontinent. Previous work on this project has resulted in considerable progress in tracking the positions of plates and microplates in the ensuing closure of Iapetus. This renewal will expand this work by supporting additional sample collections from rock sequences from suspect terranes and the adjoining margin of North America, and the completion of the paleomagnetic analysis of these and previous collections. Results should allow a synthesis of the movement histories of the oceanic terranes during closure of Iapetus and the relationship to Early Paleozoic orogenic events on the margins of North America.