Early Paleozoic subduction processes of the Paleo-Asian Ocean: Insights from geochronology and geochemistry of Paleozoic plutons in the Alxa Terrane

The Alxa Terrane is situated in a key area between the North China and Tarim cratons. Paleozoic magmatic records in this terrane place important constraints on the subduction processes of the southern Paleo-Asian Ocean. New data of zircon U-Pb ages and whole-rock elemental and isotopic data reveal two groups of intermediate to felsic plutons in the Alxa Terrane. One group consists of diorites and granitoids that were emplaced at ca. 460-440 Ma and characterized by lower Al2O3/TiO2 ratios and higher TiO2 contents, implying high temperature-low pressure crystallization conditions and a shallow source region. The second group is dominated by granitoids aged at ca. 420-407 Ma and displays high Sr and Ba, low Y and high rare earth elements, with very high Sr/Y ratios and mostly positive Eu anomalies. These characteristics imply low temperature-high pressure crystallization conditions and source regions at deep crustal levels where garnet is stable in the residual phase. Both of the two groups are mostly calc-alkaline to high-K calc-alkaline, depleted in Nb, Ta and Ti and enriched in Ba, K and Sr, indicative of an arc affinity most likely related to the southward subduction of the Paleo-Asian Ocean. Zircon εHf(t) and whole-rock εNd(t) values of these magmatic rocks decrease from 458 Ma to 440 Ma and increase from 417 Ma to 407 Ma, whereas whole-rock initial 87Sr/86Sr ratios display an opposite trend. Such an isotopic change suggests a tectonic switch from an advancing to a retreating subduction regime at ~ 407 Ma. Synthesized data from this and previous studies suggest that the 460-400 Ma magmatic arc in the Alxa Terrane represented the western extension of the Paleozoic arc belt on the northern margin of the North China Craton.