<P> The formation of the Gulf of Mexico, an oceanic rift basin located between North America and the Yucatan Block, was preceded by the breakup of the Supercontinent Pangaea in the Late - Triassic, weakening the lithosphere . Rifting between the North and South American plates continued in the Early - Jurassic, approximately 160 million years ago, and formation of the Gulf of Mexico, including subsidence due to crustal thinning, was complete by 140 Ma . Stratigraphy of the basin, which can be split into several regions, includes sediments deposited from the Jurassic through the Holocene, currently totaling a thickness between 15 and 20 kilometers . </P> <P> Beneath the sediments of the Gulf of Mexico basin, most of the pre-Triassic basement rocks are believed to be allochthonous thrust sheets sutured during the formation of Pangaea . However, it was during the break - up of the supercontinent that the foundation for the Gulf of Mexico sediments would be lain . Prior to the rifting which formed the Gulf of Mexico basin, extensional deformation in the Late - Triassic caused by the breakup up of Pangaea, and more specifically the rifting of the Atlantic Ocean, created basement graben formations which filled with terrestrial red bed sediments, and volcanic sediments from the eruption of the Central Atlantic Magmatic Plume . The plume erupted 60,000 cubic kilometers of flood basalts over ancestral North and South America, Africa and parts of Europe . In addition to the basalt flows, other important igneous rock types include diabases associated with the grabens and red beds, and overlapping, north - northwest trending dike swarms related to the tectonic volcanism of the breakup of Pangaea . </P>

Origin and development of the gulf of mexico basin
find me the text answering this question