Comment on “Evolution of high-pressure mafic granulites and pelitic gneisses from NE Madagascar: Tectonic implications”. Tectonophysics, 662, 219-242 (2015) by Ishwar-Kumar et al.

Determining the possible tectonic regimes active during the Neoproterozoic is crucial for the knowledge of the evolution of the super-continent Gondwana. In Madagascar, that occupies a key position in Gondwana, there is an on-going debate regarding the location of possible suture zones and the implications in terms of paleo-geography. Recognizing high-pressure to ultra-high pressure conditions in mafic rocks is commonly viewed as a strong argument for paleo-subduction zones. Ishwar-Kumar et al. (2015) report unusual high pressure conditions (24 kbar) in Neoproterozoic to Cambrian rocks from North-Central Madagascar (Andriamena Complex). They propose a geodynamic model in which exhumation of the high pressure terranes from up to ~ 80 km to ~ 40 km occurred via vertical extrusion during the collision of various crustal blocks after subduction and closure of an oceanic domain during the formation of Gondwana in the late Neoproterozoic to Cambrian. We question this model and in particular the (ultra-)high pressure conditions reported, because their estimation is based on a misinterpretation of the petrography and inaccurate thermodynamic modeling for the crucial metabasite sample. The authors suggest that garnet-quartz coronas around orthopyroxene and ilmenite coexist with clinopyroxene. The postulated garnet-clinopyroxene-quartz assemblage is interpreted to document an eclogite facies overprint. However, the presence of abundant plagioclase in the sample and the lack of high jadeite content in clinopyroxene clearly refute the postulated eclogite facies conditions. According to the presented photographs clinopyroxene is part of the rock matrix. We therefore suggest that the sample represents a common two-pyroxene granulite, formed at mid- to low-pressure granulite facies conditions of > 700 °C and < 6 kbar, consistent with PT data of former studies for the Andriamena Complex. Garnet-quartz-bearing coronas produced at the expense of the granulite-facies assemblage could have been produced during isobaric cooling. Although a subduction zone may have been active during this period of time in Madagascar, this interpretation is not justified by the data presented by Ishwar-Kumar et al. (2015).