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Heat, Fluids, and Melting in the Granulite Facies

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Granulites and Crustal Evolution

Part of the book series: NATO ASI Series ((ASIC,volume 311))

Abstract

Various geothermobarometric studies have yielded temperatures of 650°C to > 1000°C, and pressures of 3 to > 18kbar, for equilibration of granulite facies assemblages. This range of values, and their uncertainties, probably reflect diffusion closure rather than simply formation conditions. Geohygrometry and phase equilibria, together with fluid inclusion studies, have revealed a wide range of fluid involvement in granulite facies metamorphism from fluid-absent to H2O- or CO2-rich. A major penological problem is to distinguish those granulites which escaped partial melting, even at the above P-T conditions which mostly lie above the H2O-saturated solidus for a wide range of likely lower continental rock types.

Recent thermal modelling, which includes latent heat of melting, has indicated which tectonic events that change crustal thickness can achieve granulite facies P-T conditions even without the involvement of fluids or magmas from the mantle. Clockwise PTt paths for granulites can result from crustal thickening followed by erosional or extensional thinning. Counterclockwise PTt paths can result from thinning followed by collision thickening, perhaps in quite separate orogenies. Regional granulite terrains will not reach the surface by erosional or extensional thinning after a single collision thickening event involving continental crust of “normal” thickness. Slices of granulite facies rocks can be exhumed by collision thickening of previously thinned continental crust. Many regional granulite terrains probably reflect multicycle collision histories, and most granulite terrains become exposed tectonically.

Continental thickening which doubles a 35km continental crust with a “normal” geotherm can result in decompression dehydration-melting of metasediments (~850°C at 50km), but not of basaltic amphibolites. The latter can undergo dehydration-melting only if the basal heat-supply is increased by 50%. Amphibolites produced from more magmatically-evolved mantle-derived magmas could produce tonalitic melts in a wide variety of tectonic settings.

Rheological conditions in the lithosphere appear to be just as important for granulite emplacement, as they are for granites.

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Thompson, A.B. (1990). Heat, Fluids, and Melting in the Granulite Facies. In: Vielzeuf, D., Vidal, P. (eds) Granulites and Crustal Evolution. NATO ASI Series, vol 311. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-2055-2_4

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