Two amphiboles and a syn-metamorphic quartz vein from the Yuka terrane,North Qaidam,western China,have been analyzed by joint40Ar/39Ar crushing in vacuo and stepwise heating techniques.The crushing in vacuo results pr...Two amphiboles and a syn-metamorphic quartz vein from the Yuka terrane,North Qaidam,western China,have been analyzed by joint40Ar/39Ar crushing in vacuo and stepwise heating techniques.The crushing in vacuo results provide information to directly constrain the timing of fluid activity and the age of amphibolite-facies retrogression.The stepwise heating results could further be used to decipher the thermal history of the UHP rocks.Amphiboles from amphibolites and quartz vein within garnetamphibolite lens analyzed by in vacuo crushing yield similarly shaped age spectra and exhibit relatively flat age plateaus for the last several steps.The characteristics of gas release patterns and geochronological data testify to the presence of significant excess40Ar within the fluid inclusions.The age plateaux with weighted mean ages（WMA） ranges from 488 to 476 Ma for amphiboles and 403 Ma for quartz（2σ）.These data points constitute amphibole WMA yielding excellent isochrons with isochron ages of 469 and 463 Ma with initial40Ar/36Ar ratios of 520 and 334,respectively.The isochron ages are interpreted to represent initial amphibolite-facies retrogression.The data points constituting the quartz age plateaux give an isochron age of 405 Ma with initial40Ar/36Ar ratio of 295,recording a significant aqueous fluid flow episode during the early Devonian.Age spectra obtained by stepwise heating of amphibole residues remaining after crushing experiments are characterized by younger and relatively complex age spectra,which are probably influenced by the combined effects of resetting argon and/or mineral inclusions.Nevertheless,we note that the spectra shapes have features in common:excluding the last two steps,minimum apparent ages are found at temperatures of around 500 ℃,corresponding to319 and 249 Ma,perhaps representing the time of isotopic resetting or resulting from release gas from mineral inclusions of,e.g.,biotite or feldspar.Maximum apparent ages are obtained at temperatures of around 800℃,corresponding to 418 and 413 Ma,which probably reflect mixed ages of radiogenic resetting and original amphibole.These results indicate that the Yuka eclogites and their retrogressed equivalents were overprinted by multiple thermal events in the Silurian and possibly as young as the Triassic.展开更多
ABSTRACT： The joint methods of ^40Ar/^39Ar laser stepwise heating and in vacuo crushing have been applied to date amphiboles from the North Qaidam ultra-high pressure metamorphic amphibolites. Two amphibole samples a...ABSTRACT： The joint methods of ^40Ar/^39Ar laser stepwise heating and in vacuo crushing have been applied to date amphiboles from the North Qaidam ultra-high pressure metamorphic amphibolites. Two amphibole samples analyzed by laser heating yielded saddle-shaped age spectra with total gas ages of 574.5±2.5 and 562.5=±2.5 Ma. These ages are much older than the reported zircon U-Pb ages （-495 Ma） from Yuka eclogite, indicating the presence of excess ^40Ar. In order to decipher the occur- rence of excess ^40Ar and constrain the age of amphibolite-facies retrogression, two duplicate amphibole samples were further employed for ^40Ar/^39Ar in vacuo crushing analyses. Both samples exhibit similar monotonically declining release spectra, which are characterized by rapid decline of anomalously old apparent ages in the early steps. The data of the late steps yielded concordant apparent ages with pla- teau ages of 460.9±1.2 and 459.6±1.8 Ma. We interpret that gases released in the early steps derive from the significant excess ^40Ar containing secondary fluid inclusions （SFIs） due to their distribution characteristics along cracks leading to be easily extracted, whereas those released in the later steps rep- resent the contribution of the small primary fluid inclusions （PFIs）.展开更多
基金funded by the Chinese Academy Sciences-Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences(CAS-KNAW)Joint PhD Training Programme(ISK/3523/PhD)the joint research project between the CAS and the De Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen(06CDP002)
文摘Two amphiboles and a syn-metamorphic quartz vein from the Yuka terrane,North Qaidam,western China,have been analyzed by joint40Ar/39Ar crushing in vacuo and stepwise heating techniques.The crushing in vacuo results provide information to directly constrain the timing of fluid activity and the age of amphibolite-facies retrogression.The stepwise heating results could further be used to decipher the thermal history of the UHP rocks.Amphiboles from amphibolites and quartz vein within garnetamphibolite lens analyzed by in vacuo crushing yield similarly shaped age spectra and exhibit relatively flat age plateaus for the last several steps.The characteristics of gas release patterns and geochronological data testify to the presence of significant excess40Ar within the fluid inclusions.The age plateaux with weighted mean ages（WMA） ranges from 488 to 476 Ma for amphiboles and 403 Ma for quartz（2σ）.These data points constitute amphibole WMA yielding excellent isochrons with isochron ages of 469 and 463 Ma with initial40Ar/36Ar ratios of 520 and 334,respectively.The isochron ages are interpreted to represent initial amphibolite-facies retrogression.The data points constituting the quartz age plateaux give an isochron age of 405 Ma with initial40Ar/36Ar ratio of 295,recording a significant aqueous fluid flow episode during the early Devonian.Age spectra obtained by stepwise heating of amphibole residues remaining after crushing experiments are characterized by younger and relatively complex age spectra,which are probably influenced by the combined effects of resetting argon and/or mineral inclusions.Nevertheless,we note that the spectra shapes have features in common:excluding the last two steps,minimum apparent ages are found at temperatures of around 500 ℃,corresponding to319 and 249 Ma,perhaps representing the time of isotopic resetting or resulting from release gas from mineral inclusions of,e.g.,biotite or feldspar.Maximum apparent ages are obtained at temperatures of around 800℃,corresponding to 418 and 413 Ma,which probably reflect mixed ages of radiogenic resetting and original amphibole.These results indicate that the Yuka eclogites and their retrogressed equivalents were overprinted by multiple thermal events in the Silurian and possibly as young as the Triassic.
基金funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 41703054, 41503053)the Guangxi Natural Science Foundation Program (Nos. 2016GXNSFCA380022, 2014GXNSFBA118231)the Chinese Academy of Sciences-Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences Joint PhD Training Programme (No. O8PhD-08)
文摘ABSTRACT： The joint methods of ^40Ar/^39Ar laser stepwise heating and in vacuo crushing have been applied to date amphiboles from the North Qaidam ultra-high pressure metamorphic amphibolites. Two amphibole samples analyzed by laser heating yielded saddle-shaped age spectra with total gas ages of 574.5±2.5 and 562.5=±2.5 Ma. These ages are much older than the reported zircon U-Pb ages （-495 Ma） from Yuka eclogite, indicating the presence of excess ^40Ar. In order to decipher the occur- rence of excess ^40Ar and constrain the age of amphibolite-facies retrogression, two duplicate amphibole samples were further employed for ^40Ar/^39Ar in vacuo crushing analyses. Both samples exhibit similar monotonically declining release spectra, which are characterized by rapid decline of anomalously old apparent ages in the early steps. The data of the late steps yielded concordant apparent ages with pla- teau ages of 460.9±1.2 and 459.6±1.8 Ma. We interpret that gases released in the early steps derive from the significant excess ^40Ar containing secondary fluid inclusions （SFIs） due to their distribution characteristics along cracks leading to be easily extracted, whereas those released in the later steps rep- resent the contribution of the small primary fluid inclusions （PFIs）.
