Sturtian glaciation

The Sturtian glaciation was a major Cryogenian ice age, beginning about 717 million years ago and ending about 660 million years ago, with extensive glaciation.

Snowball Earth: A hypothesis that Earth experienced episodes of near-global glaciation during the Cryogenian. The Sturtian is a leading candidate for a Cryogenian near-global glaciation.
Cryogenian: A geological period from about 720 to 635 million years ago, within the Neoproterozoic Era. The Sturtian is the earlier of the Cryogenian's two major glaciations.
Douglas Mawson: An Australian geologist and Antarctic explorer who helped establish the geological study of South Australia. His work helped identify and describe the glacial rocks that gave the Sturtian its name.
Port Askaig Formation: A thick succession of glacial and nonglacial sedimentary rocks in Scotland and Ireland, assigned to the Sturtian glaciation. Its extensive deposits provide a prominent European record of Sturtian ice and sedimentation.
Silicate weathering: Chemical reactions between silicate rocks, water, and carbon dioxide that remove carbon from the atmosphere. Enhanced weathering before the ice age may have lowered atmospheric carbon dioxide and cooled the planet.
Neoproterozoic: A geological era spanning approximately 1,000 to 538.8 million years ago. The Sturtian belongs to this era's major climatic and environmental upheavals.
Adelaide Geosyncline: A thick Neoproterozoic sedimentary basin in South Australia, now commonly called the Adelaide Rift Complex. Its glacial strata provided the type region for recognizing the Sturtian glaciation.
Rapitan Group: A Neoproterozoic rock succession in northwestern Canada containing iron formations and glacial deposits. Its iron-rich rocks record ocean conditions during the Sturtian glaciation.
Carbonate-silicate cycle: A long-term planetary feedback linking atmospheric carbon dioxide to rock weathering, carbonate burial, and volcanic emissions. Its carbon dioxide feedback helps explain both glaciation onset and eventual deglaciation.
Glacial tillite: A poorly sorted sedimentary rock formed from lithified glacial debris. Tillites preserve direct evidence of ice transport and deposition during the Sturtian.

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