Amphibole and mica 40Ar/39Ar ages from the Kaipokok and Aillik domains, Makkovik Province, Labrador: towards a characterization of back-arc processes in the Paleoproterozoic

Abstract

We report amphibole and mica 40Ar/39Ar ages from the Makkovik Province. Amphibole ages from metamorphic rocks decrease towards the interior of the province, indicating a first-order pattern of monotonic cooling with progressive migration of the province into a more distal back-arc location. The amphibole data, in combination with muscovite ages, reveal a second-order pattern consisting of four stages corresponding to changing spatial and temporal configurations of plutonism and deformation. (1) The western Kaipokok domain cooled through muscovite closure by 1810 Ma, long after the cessation of arc magmatism. (2) The Kaipokok Bay shear zone, bounding the Kaipokok and Aillik domains, cooled through amphibole closure during 1805–1780 Ma, synchronous with emplacement of syn-tectonic granitoid plutons. (3) Between 1740 and 1700 Ma, greenschist-facies shearing occurred along the boundary between the Kaipokok domain and Nain Province synchronous with A-type plutonism and localized shearing in the western Kaipokok domain, cooling to muscovite closure temperatures in the Kaipokok Bay shear zone, and A-type plutonism and amphibole closure or resetting in the Aillik domain. (4) In the period 1650–1640 Ma, muscovite ages, an amphibole age from a shear zone, and resetting of plutonic amphibole indicate a thermal effect coinciding in part with Labradorian plutonism in the Aillik domain. Amphibole ages from dioritic sheets in the juvenile Aillik domain suggest emplacement between 1715 and 1685 Ma. Amphibole ages constrain crystallization of small mafic plutons in the Kaipokok domain (reworked Archean foreland) to be no younger than 1670–1660 Ma. These ages are the oldest yet obtained for Labradorian plutonism in the Makkovik Province.