Origin and emplacement of Archean ophiolites of the central orogenic belt, North China craton

Abstract

Understanding Archean crustal and mantle evolution hinges upon identification and characterization of oceanic lithosphere. We report and update here more than 10 years work on a complete, yet dismembered and metamorphosed Archean ophiolite sequence in the North China craton, in the Dongwanzi (东湾子)-Zunhua (遵化) structural belt and correlatives in the Wutaishan (五台山) area. Banded iron formation structurally overlies several tens of meters of variably deformed pillow lavas, mafic flows, and picritic amphibolites. These are in structural contact with a 2 km thick mixed gabbro and dike complex with gabbro screens, exposed discontinuously along strike for more than 20 km. The dikes consist of metamorphosed diabase, basalt, Hb-Cpx-gabbro, and pyroxenite. The dike/gabbro complex is underlain by several kilometers of mixed isotropic and foliated gabbro, which preserve compositional layering approximately 2 km below the dike complex, and then over several hundred meters merge into strongly compositionally layered gabbro and olivine-gabbro. The layered gabbro becomes mixed with layered pyroxenite/gabbro marking a transition zone into cumulate ultramafic rocks including serpentinized dunite, pyroxenite and wehrlite, and finally into strongly deformed and serpentinized olivine and orthopyroxene-bearing ultramafic rocks interpreted as depleted mantle harzburgite tectonites. A U/Pb zircon age of 2.505 Ga from gabbro of the Dongwanzi ophiolite makes it one of the world’s oldest recognized, laterally-extensive complete ophiolite sequences, though older dismembered ophiolites are recognized in South Africa and Greenland, extending back to 3.8 Ga. This age is confirmed by a ca. 2.6 Ga Re-Os isochron from chromites from the belt, and a number of dated 2.5–2.4 Ga cross-cutting younger igneous units. The Dongwanzi ophiolite is one of the largest well-preserved greenstone belts in the central orogenic belt that divides the North China craton into eastern and western blocks. More than 1 000 other fragments of gabbro, pillow lava, sheeted dikes, harzburgite, and podiform-chromite bearing dunite occur as tectonic blocks (tens to hundreds of meters long) in a biotite-gneiss and BIF matrix, intruded by tonalite and granodiorite, in the Zunhua structural belt. Blocks in this metamorphosed Archean ophiolitic mélange preserve deeper levels of oceanic mantle than the Dongwanzi ophiolite. The ophiolite-related mélange marks a suture zone across the North China craton, traced for more than 1 600 km along the central orogenic belt. Many of the chromitite bodies are localized in dunite envelopes within harzburgite tectonite, and have characteristic nodular and orbicular chromite textures, known elsewhere only from ophiolites. The chromites have variable but high chrome numbers (Cr/(Cr+Al)=0.74−0.93) and elevated P, also characteristic of suprasubduction zone ophiolites. The high chrome numbers, coupled with TiO₂<0.2 wt.% and V₂O₅<0.1 wt.% indicate high degrees of partial melting from a very depleted mantle source and primitive melt for the chromite. A Re-Os isochron from the chromites indicates an age of 2.6 Ga, showing that they are the same age as the Dongwanzi ophiolite. The range in initial Os isotopic compositions in the chromites in these ophiolitic blocks is small and well within the range seen in modern ophiolites. The ultramafic and ophiolitic blocks in the Zunhua mélange are therefore interpreted as dismembered and strongly deformed parts of the Dongwanzi ophiolite. We suggest the name “Dongwanzi-Zunhua ophiolite belt” for these rocks. Geochemical and structural features of the Dongwanzi ophiolite suggest that it formed in a forearc environment and was incorporated in an accretionary prism soon after it formed. Neoarchean and Paleoproterozoic (2.50 and 1.90 Ga) high-pressure granulites form a belt more than 700 km long along the western side of the central orogenic belt. Several Neoarchean sedimentary basins consisting of conglomerate, greywacke, and shale are located along the eastern side of the central orogenic belt, and are interpreted as remnants of a foreland basin. The three belts record the Neoarchean subduction and collision between an arc terrane and eastern blocks of the North China craton in the Neoarchean, and further deformation and metamorphism in the Paleoproterozoic related to collisions on the northern margin of the already amalgamated North China craton.

Keywords

North China craton / Archean / ophiolite / Proterozoic / mélange / podiform chromite

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