IndexTopic AnalysisConclusionReferencesTopic AnalysisThe state of Tennessee is very diverse. This is characterized by the variety of landscapes in the area. The Tennessee landscape is made up primarily of these landforms; river valley plains, plateaus and basins and mountains. Tennessee is also divided into three; East Tennessee, Middle Tennessee, and West Tennessee. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay East Tennessee includes the Unaka located in the Great Smoky Mountains, the Valley and Ridge Province, and all or part of the Cumberland Plateau and Mountains regions. Middle Tennessee consists of a low-lying area known as the Central or Nashville Basin, surrounded by higher terrain of the Highland Rim. West Tennessee begins in the northward-flowing reach of the Tennessee River and includes the western Tennessee Valley, the Tennessee portions of the Mississippi River floodplain at the western end of the state, and the slope of the West Tennessee Plateau (Luther). The Paleozoic sediments found in central Tennessee were deposited primarily from the Ordovician to Mississippian approximately 400 and 300 million years ago. West Tennessee is made up of Mesozoic sediments, and the Coon Creek Formation is one of the formations. Most Cenozoic deposits are found in western Tennessee, near the Mississippi levee, in the form of sands and silts. In 1979, sedimentary rock was declared the state rock of Tennessee because it is the predominant rock throughout Tennessee. The Coon Creek Formation has its location in western Tennessee and far northwest Mississippi. As noted by (Pryor and Glass, 38-51) the formation of Coon Creek dates back to the Cretaceous period approximately 70 million years ago. Tennessee during this time was submerged by the Mississippi Embayment. It formed in shallow coastal waters, less than 100 feet deep, and the marine stream was initially populated by crabs and lobsters among other marine animals (Wade, 272). Geologists have employed biostratigraphy in determining the age of the Coon Creek Formation. (Russell and Parks, 111), described biostratigraphy as the use of index fossils in the dating of sedimentary rock units, and further defined index fossils as species of plants or animals whose existence must have extended over a large area for a short period of geological time. . In their documentation of the Coon Creek formation, they were able to find that the Jeletzkytes nodosus cephalopods found in the rocks were less than 70.6 million years old, while other fossils found were older than 70.6 million years. This suggests that the Coon Creek sediment deposits were likely laid down between 71 and 70 million years ago. The shells of cephalopods and the bones of reptiles were buried under the sandy mud of the seabed. It lacks a distinct strata formation caused by burrowing organisms that mixed the bottom sediments of the Coon Creek Formation. The abundance of fossils in the Coon Creek Formation has made it among the top twelve fossil sites in the United States; sometimes they can even be found on top of each other (Noble, 16-22). It is explained that the fossils from the Coon Creek Formation were not affected by groundwater or replaced by different minerals, so the fossils tend to be found in their pristine state. Additionally, the Coon Creek Formation has a very high concentration of minerals compared to other sites requiring concentration efforts to find a representative sample. Also unconsolidated sediments in the Coon Creek Formationthey made sample collection and preparation easy. The Appalachian Plateau of the Appalachian Mountains consists of the Cumberland Plateau and the Allegheny Plateau. The Cumberland Plateau is the southeastern plateau of the Appalachian Plateau, and parts of northern Alabama and northern Georgia are the region where the Cumberland Plateau reaches. In Tennessee, for example, on the Cumberland Plateau, the western borders are the Highland Rim which lies east of the Nashville Basin and the Sequatchie Valley on the eastern plateau which extends to Alabama. The sedimentary rocks that made up the Cumberland Plateau belong to both the Mississippian (between 323 million years ago and 346 million years ago) and the Pennsylvanian (between 278 million years ago and 315 million years ago), and are for mostly composed of near-shore sediments swept progressively westward from the ancient Appalachian Mountains. Rock layers deposited in shallow coastal waters were then intertwined with the delta formation consisting of sandstones and sometimes conglomerates. About 285 million years ago the beds were laid down horizontally and were raised high enough to be eroded and then lowered, so there was deposition of more sediment on the eroded surface. beds causing numerous discontinuities in the beds. Lateral erosion of the plateau has caused the bedrock of the formation to have age differences of even less than a tenth of an inch. There are spectacular cliffs, arches, rock shelters, chimneys and other interesting geological features carved into the plateau's sandstone. The St. Louis Limestone Formation covers a large area of ​​the Midwestern United States and is exposed in western Kentucky and Middle Tennessee, including the city of Clarksville in Tennessee. The limestone deposits are said to have originated or formed about 330 - 340 million years ago, which means it is a Mississippian limestone deposit. (Thompson, 252) in his exploration of the stratigraphic sequences of the St. Louis Limestone, said that the formation consists almost of sediments with scattered chert beds, including the river chert bed on the Horse Cave Member. The St. Louis Limestone in Tennessee can be divided into two; the Upper St. Louis which consists of about one-eighth to one-third of the total lineup. It consists primarily of thin beds of medium gray to dark gray and brown micritic, pelleted, and skeletal limestone and very thin beds of medium gray shale. The lower St. Louis Limestone consists primarily of pelleted micritic limestone, calcareous shale, and silty dolomites. Common fossils found in St. Louis limestone include rugosa corals and the bryozoan Fenestrellina. The Chattanooga Formation covering five states including Tennessee, Arkansas, Alabama, Missouri and Kentucky. Fossils dating to the Devonian period have been found preserved in this formation, indicating that the age of the Chattanooga Formation ranges from approximately 419.2 to 358.9 million years. The Chattanooga Shale is a shallow geology with layers of shale and is found in eastern Tennessee and is said to be an extension of and related to the Marcellus Shale of the Appalachian region to the east. The Chattanooga Shale has piqued the interest of explorers because it has indicated the presence of significant quantities of gas. The Chattanooga Shale is a hydrocarbon-rich organic shale located throughout eastern Tennessee (Chattanooga Shale Natural Gas Field, oilshalegas.com). There are other small formations such as the Lebanon Limestones which are Ordovician in origin and are composed of thin-bedded gray limestone with limestone shale partitions. The other Nashville formation is also Ordovician and is a brownish gray phosphatic calcarenite 56 (1946): 407.