Garnet: a key to unraveling Earth's dynamic lithosphere

Abstract:

Garnet enables constraints on all parameters relevant to lithosphere studies: pressure, temperature, strain, and time. This aspect, in combination with its widespread occurrence in metamorphic rocks and ability to resist retrogression, make the mineral a prime target in research into the dynamics of mountain belts. Garnet-based petrological and geochemical tools have diversified and improved as a result of recent advancements in spatial and analytical resolution. In particular, our ability to obtain precise age constraints using garnet Lu-Hf and Sm-Nd geochronology, and interpret these in a geological context has greatly improved. This contribution highlights a series of recent enhancements to the garnet toolkit and demonstrates its versatility in two case studies set in an archetypal collisional orogen: the Pamir-Himalaya-Tibet mountain chain.

To enable a more effective use of garnet geochronology, we investigated the retentiveness of Lu-Hf and Sm-Nd isotope signatures in naturally metamorphosed garnet. Diffusive re-equilibration of these signatures is shown to occur to a minor, if not insignificant, extent during crustal metamorphism, thus firmly establishing these methods as reliable geochronometers. Diffusive major-element zoning analysis of the same garnet led to the development of a new thermometric tool, which was shown to provide reliable temperature estimates for a wide variety of rocks and terranes.

We used Lu-Hf garnet geochronology to show that mid-crustal flow and ‘Barrovian-type’ metamorphism of rocks now exposed in the North Himalayan Gneiss Domes in Central Tibet commenced in the early Eocene. This result is the first to confirm that crustal thickening and contraction in the Tibetan Himalaya was broadly synchronous with the collision between Greater India and Eurasia. Garnet dating and thermometry, and rutile U-Pb thermochronology in the Pamir revealed a history of heating to 750-830 °C, commencing at 37 Ma in the South Pamir and occurring progressively later northward. This study advocates a causal link between Indian slab break-off to the south and progressive prograde heating of the Pamir hanging wall. Both studies demonstrate the ability of garnet to characterize crucial yet typically difficult to constrain early stages of mountain building.