Petrophysical and paleomagnetic data of drill cores from the Bosumtwi impact structure, Ghana

Abstract

Physical properties from rocks of the Bosumtwi impact structure, Ghana, Central Africa, are essential to understand the formation of the relatively young (1.07 Ma) and small (10.5 km) impact crater and to improve its geophysical modeling. Results of our petrophysical studies of deep drill cores LB-07A and LB-08A reveal distinct lithological patterns but no depth dependence. The most conspicuous difference between impactites and target lithologies are the lower bulk densities and significantly higher porosities of the suevite and lithic breccia units compared to meta-graywacke and metapelites of target lithologies. Magnetic susceptibility shows mostly paramagnetic values (200500 106 SI) throughout the core, with an exception of a few metasediment samples, and correlates positively with natural remanent magnetization (NRM) and Q values. These data indicate that magnetic parameters are related to inhomogeneously distributed ferrimagnetic pyrrhotite. The paleomagnetic data reveals that the characteristic direction of NRM has shallow normal (in a few cases shallow reversed) polarity, which is in agreement with the Lower Jaramillo N-polarity chron direction, and is carried by ferrimagnetic pyrrhotite. However, our study has not revealed the expected high magnetization body required from previous magnetic modeling. Furthermore, the LB-07A and LB08-A drill cores did not show the predicted high content of melt in the rocks, requiring a new interpretation model for magnetic data.