The Mino Terrane

Central part of the Japanese Islands is underlain by basement rock-formations, consisting of limestone, greenstone, chert, shale, sandstone and sporadically conglomerate, which have been believed to be mostly late Paleozoic in age up to the 1960's, and, after the finding of Triassic conodonts in chert, to be mostly late Paleozoic to Triassic in the 1970's. It was the late 1970's to early 1980's in Japan that the main part of the basement complex is confirmed to be composed of Jurassic formations by the late Jurassic assemblage of Radiolaria in the siliceous tuffaceous shale from Hida-Kanayama (located in central part of the Mino terrane) reported by Mizutani(1981) and from the neighboring areas by Mizutani and others (1981). The Mino terrane is a late Jurassic to early Cretaceous melange terrane composed chiefly of Permian limestone-greenstone complex, Triassic bedded chert and shale, Jurassic siliceous tuffaceous shale, shale, sandstone and conglomerate. The geological investigations and biostratigraphic works along with the paleontological studies have been done by dealing with rocks collected in the Mino terrane mainly in Nagoya University; therefore, most of the materials contained in this database are the data obtained in the Mino terrane of Central Japan.