Antarctica and Australia, the (nearly) unseparatables - a review

Today, Antarctica and Australia are >3000 km apart. However, the main parts of both continents formed an integrated unity for the longest time of the earth's history. Uniform Jurassic volcanism is the relatively youngest indication of the unified continent. The formation of Gondwana was accompanied by a subduction orogeny at its palaeo-Pacific margin ∼500 Ma ago; its structures continue from Antarctica into Australia. Finally, terrains and structures of the East Antarctic Craton extend into the South-Australian Gawler Craton, e.g. the Antarctic Mertz Shear Zone as Kalinjala Mylonite Zone in Australia. This shear zone may reflect a long period of the common history concerning both continents starting with dextral shearing under granulite facies conditions ∼1.7 Ga ago up to Mesozoic-Cenozoic brittle deformation during the Antarctic-Australian separation.