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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Earth Sci.
Sec. Geochemistry
Volume 13 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/feart.2025.1578301
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The Lesser Xing'an-Zhangguangcai Range tectonic belt in northeastern China is located along the eastern margin of the Central Asian Orogenic Belt and serves as the key to understanding the tectonic transition between the Paleo-Asian Ocean and Paleo-Pacific regimes during the Early Mesozoic. This study presented the zircon U-Pb geochronology, Hf isotope, and whole-rock geochemistry of Early Jurassic syenogranites from the northern Zhangguangcailing Range. The LA-ICP-MS zircon dating result indicates a crystallization age of 194 ± 2 Ma. Integrated with regional data, this study confirmed that the Early Mesozoic magmatism in the region was concentrated in the Early Jurassic (180-200 Ma). The granites displayed typical arc-related features, including (1) high SiO2 (70.59-76.81 wt.%), alkali enrichment (Na2O+K2O = 7.65-8.38 wt.%), low Mg and Fe contents, classifying them as the high-K calc-alkaline metaluminous to weakly peraluminous (A/CNK = 0.99-1.04); (2) strong LREE enrichment with weak Eu anomalies (δEu = 0.44-0.81) and HREE depletion ((La/Yb)N = 3.38-16.17); and (3) enrichment in LILEs (Rb, K) with the corresponding depletion in HFSEs (Nb, Ta, and Ti). Harker diagrams showed negative correlations between SiO2 and MgO, TiO2, CaO, TFeO, P2O5, and Eu, indicating fractional crystallization involving amphibole, ilmenite, apatite, and feldspar. The zircon εHf(t) values (+2.7 to +5.0) and the corresponding Meso-to Neoproterozoic crustal model ages (TDM2 = 915-1067 Ma) suggested that the magma originated from partial melting of the Meso-Neoproterozoic mafic lower crust at amphibolite facies. The geochemical and isotopic data collectively identified these rocks as I-type granite. In a regional tectonic context, their formation was interpreted to reflect an active continental margin environment driven by the westward subduction of the Paleo-Pacific Plate during the Early Jurassic, potentially influenced by the closure of the Mudanjiang Ocean, a branch of the Paleo-Pacific.
Keywords: I-type granite 1, Zhangguangcai range 2, lithogeochemistry 3, U-Pb age 4, Hf isotop-ic 5
Received: 17 Feb 2025; Accepted: 09 Apr 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Liu, Duan, Huang, Song, Lin and Zhan. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Mingxin Duan, Harbin Center for Integrated Natural Resources Survey, China Geological Survey, Harbin, China
Jimin Huang, Harbin Center for Integrated Natural Resources Survey, China Geological Survey, Harbin, China
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