Overlap sections of cores and correlative outcrop sections show that lake highstand deposits deepen and packages of lake cycles thicken toward the border fault system and intrabasinal normal faults as well as toward the longitudinal center of the basin. Deeper-water highstand deposits generally are thicker than less deep highstand deposits, which may reflect an increase in sedimentation rates during wetter climatic episodes. Overall, however, most of the thickening observed in the overlap sections is expressed in the red units, which are generally interpreted to be regressive facies. This is likely due to reworking and basinward transport of marginal lake sediments as the lakes shoaled. Basin-wide correlations indicate that the central fault block contains a higher percentage of sandstone than the northeastern fault block (in which the cores are located), likely due to synsedimentary movement on the Flemington intrabasinal fault.

Although gross aspects of the cyclostratigraphy can be unambiguously correlated over long distances, extremely fine-scale (cm) analyses of selected members of the Passaic Formation, each representing ~400 kyr of depositional history, show additional lake-level fluctuations with frequencies higher than ~21 kyr. In addition, fine-scale changes in sedimentary structures indicative of minor fluctuations in lake level are not always correlatable. These changes may reflect an irregular shoreline, major embayments, or significant topographic irregularities (e.g., minor fault blocks, deltas, differential compaction).

Other notable features observed in core and outcrop include lake highstand deposits recognized in red units that comprise poorly documented "all-red" cycles, and increases in precessional cycle thickness during the wetter portions of a 2 Myr cycle.

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