Abstract Silicate liquid immiscibility was a common mechanism during the late-stage evolution of lunar basaltic magmas, which produced co-existing and immiscible Si- and Fe-rich melts. However, the relationship between silicate liquid immiscibility and lunar granitic rocks is debated. In this study, we investigated Si-rich melt inclusions hosted in fayalite fragments from lunar soil returned by the Chang’e 5 mission. These melt inclusions have high SiO2 (76.4 wt.%), Al2O3 (11.1 wt.%), and K2O (5.8 wt.%), and low FeO (2.8 wt.%), TiO2 (0.42 wt.%), and MgO (0.02 wt.%) contents. The texture and chemical composition indicate that these Si-rich melt inclusions formed through late-stage silicate liquid immiscibility of the Chang’e 5 mare basaltic magma. Mass balance considerations show that the unfractionated rare earth element patterns and Eu anomalies of these melt inclusions are similar to those of lunar granitic rocks. Dynamic calculations indicate that the accumulation of Si-rich melt was hindered by the high cooling rate of the Chang’e 5 basaltic magma after eruption. However, in deep-crustal magma chambers, basaltic magma would have cooled slowly and the Si-rich melt generated by late-stage silicate liquid immiscibility would possibly have had enough time to migrate upwards and accumulate to form a granitic melt body of significant size. The results of this study support the possibility that lunar granitic rocks are products of silicate liquid immiscibility.
In this paper, we have conducted geochronological and geochemical studies on the metamorphic rocks of the Khaychingol and Ereendavaa Formations in the Mogoitiin Gol, Khaychin Gol and Emgentiin Bulag areas from the Ereendavaa terrane and these rocks have been considered to be Precambrian in age. However, new LA–ICP–MS zircon U–Pb dating results indicate that the protolith of the studied metamorphic rocks was formed in two stages: 1) during ~ 296 - 285 Ma, the protolith of mafic, felsic and black schists formed; 2) during ~276 - 271 Ma, the protolith of gneiss and psammitic schists began to deposit. The Early Permian bimodal association composed of low-K basalt and comagmatic high-Na, low-K dacite with high-K calc-alkaline rhyolite, represent protolith of the mafic and felsic schists which were formed in back-arc basin environment. The Middle Permian gneiss, and psammitic schists with sedimentary protolith have geochemical signatures of island arc rocks, such as enrichment of LILE relative to HFSE, and markedly negative Nb, Ta and Ti anomalies, suggesting that they were formed in a continental arc environment. Considering a close spatial relationship of the Ereendavaa terrane with the Mongol-Okhotsk Belt in the north-west, we propose that accompanied with the emplacement of arc magmatic rocks, the arc rifting occurred and formed the Early Permian bimodal volcanic rocks. In the Late Permian, after the formation of the back-arc basin, deposition of the immature deposits as wacke, arkose and litharenite dominated sediments in a continental arc environment started.
Remote sensing observations have shown that the far side of the Moon (lunar farside) has different geology and rock composition to those of the nearside, including the abundances of potassium, rare earth elements, and phosphorus (collectively known as KREEP). The Chang’e-6 (CE-6) spacecraft collected samples from the South Pole–Aitken (SPA) basin on the farside and brought them to Earth. We used lead-lead and rubidium-strontium isotope systems to date low-titanium basalt in a CE-6 sample, finding a consistent age of 2830 (±5) million years. We interpret this as the date of volcanism in SPA and incorporate it into lunar crater chronology. Strontium, neodymium, and lead isotopes indicate that the volcanic magma was from a lunar mantle source depleted in incompatible elements and containing almost no KREEP component.
Reconstructing meandering paleo-channels is attracting global research attention. We implemented a novel method by comprehensively integrating migration models and sedimentary structures. Firstly, the migration architectures of the corresponding characteristics in planform and cross-sectional models were summarised as expansion, translation, expansion and translation, expansion and downstream rotation, constriction and downstream rotation, and expansion and countercurrent rotation models. Secondly, full continuous core data from 270 dense drilling wells were collected from the Daqing Oil Field in the Songliao Basin, China, providing information on rock textures, sedimentary cycles, and boundary information for the two layers being studied. Through a comprehensive analysis of dense drill cores and logging data, the abandoned channels and the initial and final channel centrelines were identified. Consequently, four profiles, including one longitudinal and three transverse sections, were constructed to reveal the cross-sectional structures and planform migration architecture. Profile interpretation revealed the evolution from the initial channel centreline to the final centreline. Using a method of rational interpolation, we were able to reconstruct the migration architecture of the meandering channels. The results showed that the average ancient bankfull width (Wc) was approximately 100 m, a single meandering belt was 800 m, the radius of the curvature was 250 m, the length of the channel bend was 700 m, the average meander wavelength was 1300 m, the sinuosity was 3.0, and the annual average discharge rate was 450 m3/s. Furthermore, we compared the results from empirical equations, which verified that our reconstruction is both feasible and potentially widely applicable.
Abstract The voluminous Late Mesozoic porphyry ore‐related adakitic magmatism in central‐eastern China is crucial to understand the deep geodynamic process of the region and controls on porphyry deposit formation globally. Here, we present a novel study of whole‐rock Mo‐B isotopes on the mineralization‐related adakitic rocks from the Dexing (located in the interior of South China and associated with giant porphyry Cu deposits), and Middle‐Lower Yangtze River (MLYR) (host to one of the largest porphyry Cu‐Au deposit belts) areas in central‐eastern China. The Dexing adakitic rocks have δ 98/95 Mo ranging from −0.31‰ to −0.01‰ and δ 11 B from −17.65‰ to −11.49‰. The adakitic rocks from the MLYR area have δ 98/95 Mo values of −0.5‰ to 0.2‰ and δ 11 B values of −14.48‰ to −9.53‰. The δ 98/95 Mo values of both the Dexing and MLYR samples negatively correlate with the La/Yb and La/Sm ratios. Together with the high Mg#, Cr, and Ni contents, these results indicate a process of melt‐mantle interaction resulting in hybridization of initial adakitic melts with low δ 98/95 Mo and mantle‐derived melts/components with high δ 98/95 Mo. These adakitic rocks have distinct Mo isotope systematics compared with those of oceanic slab‐derived adakites and MORB‐type eclogites. Their relatively low δ 11 B values and the lack of correlation between δ 11 B and B contents support a mafic lower crust source for the initial adakitic melts. We thus suggest that these adakitic rocks were generated by partial melting of delaminated lower crust followed by interaction with the deep mantle, and that melt‐mantle interaction may facilitate Cu‐Mo‐Au mineralization.