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New constraints on metamorphism in the Highjump Archipelago, East Antarctica

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 August 2016

Naomi M. Tucker  and
Martin Hand
Naomi M. Tucker*
Affiliation:
Department of Earth Science, School of Physical Sciences, The University of Adelaide, Adelaide, SA 5005, Australia
Martin Hand
Affiliation:
Department of Earth Science, School of Physical Sciences, The University of Adelaide, Adelaide, SA 5005, Australia
*
naomi.tucker@adelaide.edu.au
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Abstract

The age and conditions of metamorphism in the Highjump Archipelago, East Antarctica, are investigated using samples collected during the 1986 Australian Antarctic expedition to the Bunger Hills–Denman Glacier region. In situ U-Pb dating of monazite from three metasedimentary rocks yields ages between c. 1240–1150 Ma and a weighted mean 207Pb/206Pb age of 1183±8 Ma, consistent with previous constraints on the timing of metamorphism in this region and Stage 2 of the Albany–Fraser Orogeny in south-western Australia. This age is interpreted to date the development of garnet ± sillimanite ± rutile-bearing assemblages that formed at c. 850–950°C and 6–9 kbar. Peak granulite facies metamorphism was followed by decompression, evidenced largely by the partial replacement of garnet by cordierite. These new pressure–temperature determinations suggest that the Highjump Archipelago attained slightly higher temperature and pressure conditions than previously proposed and that the rocks probably experienced a clockwise pressure–temperature evolution.

Keywords

Bunger Hillsmonazite geochronologyMusgrave–Albany–Fraser OrogenP–T pseudosection
Type
Earth Sciences
Information
Antarctic Science , Volume 28 , Issue 6 , December 2016 , pp. 487 - 503
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Copyright
© Antarctic Science Ltd 2016 

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