Éditeur(s) : HAL CCSD Geological Society of America
Résumé : If the net flux to the island arc crust is primitive arc basalt, the evolved composition of most arc magmas entails the formation of complementary thick ultramafic keels at the root of the island arc crust. Dunite, wehrlite, and Cr-rich pyroxenite from the Jijal complex, constituting the Moho transition zone of the Kohistan paleo–island arc (northern Pakistan), are often mentioned as an example of high-pressure cumulates formed by intracrustal fractionation of mantle-derived melts, which were later extracted to form the overlying mafic crust. Here we show that calculated liquids for Jijal pyroxenites-wehrlites are strongly rare earth element (REE) depleted and display flat or convex-upward REE patterns. These patterns are typical of boninites and are therefore unlike those of the overlying mafic crust that have higher REE concentrations and are derived from light rare earth element (LREE)–enriched melts similar to island arc basalt. This observation, along with the lower 208Pb/204Pb and 206Pb/204Pb ratios of Jijal pyroxenites-wehrlites relative to gabbros, rejects the hypothesis that gabbros and ultramafic rocks derive from a common melt via crystal fractionation. In the 208Pb/204Pb versus 206Pb/204Pb diagram, ultramafic rocks and gabbros lie on the same positive correlation, suggesting that their sources share a common enriched mantle 2 (EM2) signature but with a major depleted component contribution for the ultramafic rocks. These data are consistent with a scenario whereby the Jijal ultramafic section represents a Moho transition zone formed via melt-rock reaction between subarc mantle and incoming melt isotopically akin to Jijal gabbroic rocks. The lack in the Kohistan arc of cogenetic ultramafic cumulates complementary to the evolved mafic plutonic rocks implies either (1) that a substantial volume of such ultramafic cumulates was delaminated or torn out by subcrustal mantle flow from the base of the arc crust in extraordinarily short time scales (0.10–0.35 cm/yr), or (2) that the net flux to the Kohistan arc crust was more evolved than primitive arc basalt.
ISSN: 0091-7613

hal-00406688
https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00406688
DOI : 10.1130/G23675A.1

Éditeur(s) : HAL CCSD Elsevier
Résumé : International audience
Geochemical studies of primitive basalts have documented the presence of crustal-derived garnet pyroxenite in their mantle sources. The processes whereby melts with the signature of garnet pyroxenite are produced in the mantle are, however, poorly understood and somewhat controversial. Here we investigate a natural example of the interaction between melts of garnet pyroxenite derived from recycled plagioclase-rich crust and surrounding mantle in the Ronda peridotite massif. Melting of garnet pyroxenite at ∼1.5 GPa generated spinel websterite residues with MREE/HREE fractionation and preserved the positive Eu anomaly of their garnet pyroxenite precursor in whole-rock and clinopyroxene. Reaction of melts from garnet pyroxenite with depleted surrounding peridotite generated secondary fertile spinel lherzolite. These secondary lherzolites differ from common spinel lherzolite from Ronda and elsewhere by their lower-Mg# in clinopyroxene, orthopyroxene and olivine, lower-Cr# in spinel and higher whole-rock Al2O3, CaO, Sm/Yb and FeO⁎ at a given SiO2. Remarkably, secondary spinel lherzolite shows the geochemical signature of ghost plagioclase in the form of positive Eu and Sr anomalies in whole-rock and clinopyroxene, reflecting the transfer of a low-pressure crustal imprint from recycled pyroxenite to hybridized peridotite. Garnet pyroxenite melting and melt-peridotite interaction, as shown in the Ronda massif, may explain how the signature of subducted or delaminated crust is transferred to the mantle and how a garnet pyroxenite component is introduced into the source region of basalts. The efficiency of these processes in conveying the geochemical imprint of crustal-derived garnet pyroxenite to extruded lavas depends on the reactivity of pyroxenite melt with peridotite and the mantle permeability, which may be controlled by prior refertilization reactions similar to those documented in the Ronda massif. Highly fertile heterogeneities produced by pyroxenite-peridotite interaction, such as secondary spinel lherzolite in Ronda, may nucleate magmatic channels that remain chemically isolated from the ambient mantle and act as preferential pathways for melts with the signature of recycled crust.
ISSN: 0012-821X

hal-00814010
https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00814010
DOI : 10.1016/j.epsl.2012.11.047

Éditeur(s) : HAL CCSD University of Chicago Press
Résumé : International audience
Contrasting tectonic reconstructions of the westernmost Mediterranean have been proposed to explain the origin of the Alboran marine basin contemporaneously with Cenozoic convergence between the African and European plates. Cr-rich pyroxenites in the Ronda massif record the geochemical processes occurring in the subcontinental mantle of the Alboran domain in the Late Oligocene, thus constraining the geodynamic scenario of Cenozoic extension in the western Mediterranean lithosphere. Clinopyroxene in intrusive Cr-rich websterite dikes crosscutting the Ronda peridotite is strongly depleted in Nb-Ta and enriched in light rare earth elements, as typically observed in arc magmas, and is in trace element equilibrium with Neogene subduction-related lavas from the western and central Mediterranean. Sr-Nd-Pb radiogenic isotopes indicate that the mantle source of the Ronda pyroxenite dikes was contaminated by a subduction component released by detrital sediments likely deposited in passive continental margins. Rather than convective removal or delamination of the lithospheric root, our data strongly support Alboran geodynamic models that envisage slab rollback as the tectonic mechanism responsible for the Miocene lithospheric thinning. The Ronda Cr-rich pyroxenite dikes represent the earliest unambiguous manifestation of subduction-related magmatism in the western Mediterranean and testify to the involvement of terrigenous sediments in the primitive stages of subduction.
ISSN: 0022-1376

hal-00745853
https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00745853
DOI : 10.1086/663875

Éditeur(s) : HAL CCSD Elsevier
Résumé : International audience
The Sapat peridotite in Kohistan (NW Pakistan) is a 12x1 km sized body of meta-harzburgites, dunites, pyroxenites and meta-gabbros in the hanging wall of the Indus Suture Zone. Field relations, micro-textures, bulk and mineral chemistry document melt-rock reactions producing dunites at the expense of meta-harzburgites, and a consecutive olivine-clinopyroxenite formation from the same melt type. The association of mesa-gabbros, dunites, and pyroxenites is interpreted as a crust-mantle transition zone produced by the percolation of highly depleted primitive arc melt. The meta-harzburgites represent large portions of refractoty mantle that have suffered melt extraction and metasomatism prior to their interaction with the dunite-forming primitive arc melt and the establishment of the crust-mantle transition zone. Uncommon vein assemblages in the dunites that include Cr-clinochlore, calcite and olivine document a late percolation of slab-related, volatile-rich fluids. Taking into account the highly refractory composition of the Sapat mantle, its structural position, the evidence for interaction with highly depleted arc melts and the sub-solidus interaction with volatile-rich arc fluids, the Sapat ultramafic rocks are interpreted as being derived from the frontal Kohistan arc, representing a crust-mantle transition formed by arc magmatism.
ISSN: 0024-4937

hal-00424515
https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00424515
DOI : 10.1016/j.lithos.2008.07.004