Cooling and exhumation of the Rieserferner Pluton (Eastern Alps, Italy/Austria)

Abstract.

The Defereggen–Antholz–Vals (DAV) Line marks the southern border of alpine greenschist facies metamorphism within the Austroalpine basement to the south of the western Tauern window. During the Oligocene sinistral-strike slip, coeval with vertical displacement, was accompanied by the syntectonic emplacement of the Rieserferner Pluton along the north side of the fault. To the north of the DAV Line Rb/Sr as well as K/Ar-biotite cooling ages continuously increase from 16 Ma at the Rensen Pluton in the west to 30 Ma at the eastern end of the Rieserferner Pluton. Similar trends are apparent from zircon and apatite fission-track data, which increase eastward from 19 to 29 Ma, and 13 to 16 Ma, respectively. Low cooling rates allow a direct transformation into exhumation rates assuming an average geothermal gradient of 28 °C km^–1. The resulting exhumation rates of less than 1 mm year^–1 do not affect the depth of isotherms in a geologically significant manner. Hence, variable cooling rates within the basement north of the DAV Line are a result of differential exhumation of individual blocks. High exhumation rates bracketed between the intrusion age of the Rieserferner Pluton at 31±3 Ma and the apatite partial annealing zone (PAZ) range between 0.4 and 0.6 mm year^–1, whereas final exposure takes place at reduced exhumation rates of 0.2 mm year^–1. East-side-down tilting of the block north of the DAV Line, as indicated by variations in exhumation rates, strongly affects the western part of the area studied between the Rensen and the Central Rieserferner Pluton whereas, further east, block rotation becomes less important. A total difference in exhumation of about 2.2 km corresponding to 5° tilting between the Western and Eastern Rieserferner, as indicated by K/Ar-biotite and zircon fission-track data, occurred before going through the PAZ for apatite fission-tracks. Furthermore, the significance of the cooling ages, especially for biotite, is tested by calculating a finite element approximation. Different numerical models indicate fast cooling of the intrusive melts prior to approaching the closure temperature of the K/Ar system in biotite.