Geology topics

L. Ratschbacher

Publications and source records attributed to L. Ratschbacher.

3 recordsLinked to original sources

USGS2007

How was the Triassic Songpan-Ganzi basin filled? A provenance study

The Triassic Songpan-Ganzi complex comprises >200,000 km2 of 5-15 km thick turbiditic sediments. Although surrounded by several magmatic and orogenic belts, the Triassic high- and ultrahigh-pressure Qinling-Tongbai-Hong'an-Dabie (QTHD) orogen, located several hundred kilometers to the east, was proposed as its major source. Middle to Late Triassic samples from the northern and southern Songpan-Ganzi complex, studied using detrital white mica 40Ar/39Ar ages, Si-in-white mica content, and detrital zircon U/Pb ages, suggest that the northern Songpan-Ganzi deposystem obtained detritus from the north: the north China block, east Kunlun, northern Qaidam, Qilian, and western Qinling; the southern Songpan-Ganzi deposystem was supplied from the northeasterly located Paleozoic QTHD area throughout the Ladinian and received detritus from the Triassic Hong'an-Dabie orogen during the Carnian, indicative of exhumation of the orogen at that time. The QTHD orogen fed the Norian samples in the southeastern southern Songpan-Ganzi deposystem, signifying long drainage channels along the western margin of the south China block. An additional supply from the Emeishan magmatic province and/or the Yidun arc is suggested by the paucity of white mica in the southern Songpan-Ganzi deposystem. Mica ages of Rhaetian sediments from the northwestern Sichuan basin best correlate with those of the Triassic QTHD orogen. Our Si-in-white mica data demonstrate that the high- and ultrahigh-pressure rocks of the Hong'an-Dabie Shan were not exposed in the Middle to Late Triassic.

Tectonics↗

USGS2004

Assembly of the Pamirs: Age and origin of magmatic belts from the southern Tien Shan to the southern Pamirs and their relation to Tibet

Magmatic rocks and depositional setting of associated volcaniclastic strata along a north-south traverse spanning the southern Tien Shan and eastern Pamirs of Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan constrain the tectonics of the Pamirs and Tibet. The northern Pamirs and northwestern Tibet contain the north facing Kunlun suture, the south facing Jinsha suture, and the intervening Carboniferous to Triassic Karakul-Mazar subduction accretion system; the latter is correlated with the Songpan-Garze-Hoh Xi system of Tibet. The Kunlun arc is a composite early Paleozoic to late Paleozoic-Triassic arc. Arc formation in the Pamirs is characterized by ???370-320 Ma volcanism that probably continued until the Triassic. The cryptic Tanymas suture of the southern northern Pamirs is part of the Jinsha suture. A massive ??????227 Ma batholith stitches the Karakul-Mazar complex in the Pamirs. There are striking similarities between the Qiangtang block in the Pamirs and Tibet. Like Tibet, the regional structure of the Pamirs is an anticlinorium that includes the Muskol and Sares domes. Like Tibet, the metamorphic rocks in these domes are equivalents to the Karakul-Mazar-Songpan-Garze system. Granitoids intruding the Qiangtang block yield ???200-230 Ma ages in the Pamirs and in central Tibet. The stratigraphy of the eastern Pshart area in the Pamirs is similar to the Bangong-Nujiang suture zone in the Amdo region of eastern central Tibet, but a Triassic ocean basin sequence is preserved in the Pamirs. Arc-type granitoids that intruded into the eastern Pshart oceanic-basin-arc sequence (???190-160 Ma) and granitoids that cut the southern Qiangtang block (???170-160 Ma) constitute the Rushan-Pshart arc. Cretaceous plutons that intruded the central and southern Pamirs record a long-lasting magmatic history. Their zircons and those from late Miocene xenoliths show that the most distinct magmatic events were Cambro-Ordovician (???410-575 Ma), Triassic (???210-250 Ma; likely due to subduction along the Jinsha suture), Middle Jurassic (???147-195 Ma; subduction along Rushan-Pshart suture), and mainly Cretaceous. Middle and Late Cretaceous magmatism may reflect arc activity in Asia prior to the accretion of the Karakoram block and flat-slab subduction along the Shyok suture north of the Kohistan-Ladakh arc, respectively. Before India and Asia collided, the Pamir region from the Indus-Yarlung to the Jinsha suture was an Andean-style plate margin. Our analysis suggests a relatively simple crustal structure for the Pamirs and Tibet. From the Kunlun arc in the north to the southern Qiangtang block in the south the Pamirs and Tibet likely have a dominantly sedimentary crust, characterized by Karakul-Mazar-Songpan-Garze accretionary wedge rocks. The crust south of the southern Qiangtang block is likely of granodioritic composition, reflecting long-lived subduction, arc formation, and Cretaceous-Cenozoic underthrusting. Copyright 2004 by the American Geophysical Union.

Tectonics↗

USGS2003

Tectonics of the Qinling (Central China): Tectonostratigraphy, geochronology, and deformation history

The Qinling orogen preserves a record of late mid-Proterozoic to Cenozoic tectonism in central China. High-pressure metamorphism and ophiolite emplacement (Songshugou ophiolite) assembled the Yangtze craton, including the lower Qinling unit, into Rodinia during the ~1.0 Ga Grenvillian orogeny. The lower Qinling unit then rifted from the Yangtze craton at ~0.7 Ga. Subsequent intra-oceanic arc formation at ~470-490 Ma was followed by accretion of the lower Qinling unit first to the intra-oceanic arc and then to the Sino-Korea craton. Subduction then imprinted a ~400 Ma Andean-type magmatic arc onto all units north of the northern Liuling unit. Oblique subduction created Silurian-Devonian WNW-trending, sinistral transpressive wrench zones (e.g., Lo-Nan, Shang-Dan), and Late Permian-Early Triassic subduction reactivated them in dextral transpression (Lo-Nan, Shang-Xiang, Shang-Dan) and subducted the northern edge of the Yangtze craton. Exhumation of the cratonal edge formed the Wudang metamorphic core complex during dominantly pure shear crustal extension at ~230-235 Ma. Post-collisional south-directed shortening continued through the Early Jurassic. Cretaceous reactivation of the Qinling orogen started with NW-SE sinistral transtension, coeval with large-scale Early Cretaceous crustal extension and sinistral transtension in the northern Dabie Shan; it presumably resulted from the combined effects of the Siberia-Mongolia-Sino-Korean and Lhasa-West Burma-Qiangtang-Indochina collisions and Pacific subduction. Regional dextral wrenching was active within a NE-SW extensional regime between ~60 and 100 Ma. An Early Cretaceous Andean-type continental magmatic arc, with widespread Early Cretaceous magmatism and back-arc extension, was overprinted by shortening related to the collision of Yangtze-Indochina Block with the West Philippines Block. Strike-slip and normal faults associated with Eocene half-graben basins record Paleogene NNE-SSW contraction and WNW-ESE extension. The Neogene(?) is characterized by normal faults and NNE-trending sub-horizontal extension. Pleistocene(?)-Quaternary NW-SE extension and NE-SW contraction comprises sinistral strike-slip faults and is part of the NW-SE extension imposed across eastern Asia by the India-Asia collision.

Tectonophysics↗