Provenance reconstructions. Article 1. Mineralogical and petrographic approaches and methods

Research subject. This is the first in the series of four articles, which aims to review existing provenance reconstruction tools. Methods and materials . The data obtained during evaluation of different sandstone allothigenous components was used as a basis for analysis. The data was collected from the Upper Riphean Zilmerdak Formation Bir’yan Member and the Upper Vendian Bassa Formation (Southern Urals); the Upper Devonian Kodinka and Ust’kodinka formations (Middle Urals); the Lower Cretaceous Sortym Formation (Western Siberian sedimentary megabasin, Bolshekhetskaya depression). Results . The sandstone composition patterns of the lithostratigraphic units under study allowed the most common provenance features to be established by means of comparing data obtained by various diagrams. Conclusions . It is established that only the Kodinka, Ust’kodinka and Sortym sandstone compositions can be used as a source for rock reconstruction analysis, while the Bir’yan and Basa sandstone compositions have undergone massive transformations.