Contrasting stable isotope behavior between calcite and dolomite marbles, Lone Mountain, Nevada

Abstract

Late Proterozoic to Cambrian carbonate rocks from Lone Mountain, west central Nevada, record multiple post-depositional events including: (1) diagenesis, (2) Mesozoic regional metamorphism, (3) Late Cretaceous contact metamorphism, related to the emplacement of the Lone Mountain granitic pluton and (4) Tertiary hydrothermal alteration associated with extension, uplift and intrusion of silicic porphyry and lamprophyre dikes. Essentially pure calcite and dolomite marbles have stable isotopic compositions that can be divided into two groups, one with positive δ13C values from+3.1 to +1.4 ‰ (PDB) and high δ18O values from +21.5 to +15.8 ‰ (SMOW), and the other with negative δ13C values from –3.3 to –3.6‰ and low δ18O values from +16.9 to +11.1‰. Marbles also contain minor amounts of quartz, muscovite and phlogopite. Brown and blue luminescent, clear, smooth textured quartz grains from orange luminescent calcite marbles have high δ18O values from +23.9 to +18.1‰, while brown luminescent, opaque, rough textured quartz grains from red luminescent dolomite marbles typically have low δ18O values from +2.0 to +9.3‰. The δ18O values of muscovite and phlogopite from marbles are typical of micas in metamorphic rocks, with values between +10.4 and +14.4‰, whereas mica δD values are very depleted, varying from −102 to −156‰. No significant lowering of the δ18O values of Lone Mountain carbonates is inferred to have occurred during metamorphism as a result of devolatilization reactions because of the essentially pure nature of the marbles. Bright luminescence along the edges of fractures, quartz cements and quartz overgrowths in dolomite marbles, low δD values of micas, negative δ13C values and low δ18O values of calcite and dolomite, and depleted δ18O values of quartz from dolomite marbles all indicate that meteoric fluids interacted with Lone Mountain marbles during the Tertiary. Partial oxygen isotopic exchange between calcite and low 18O meteoric fluids lowered the δ18O values of calcite, resulting in uniform quartz-calcite fractionations that define an apparent pseudoisotherm. These quartz-calcite fractionations significantly underestimate both the temperature of metamorphism and the temperature of post-metamorphic alteration. Partial oxygen isotopic exchange between quartz and meteoric fluids also resulted in 18O depletion of quartz from dolomite marbles. This partial exchange was facilitated by an increase in the surface area of the quartz as a result of its dissolution by meteoric fluids. The negative δ13C values in carbonates result from the oxidation of organic material by meteoric fluids following metamorphism. Stable isotopic data from Lone Mountain marbles are consistent with the extensive circulation of meteoric hydrothermal fluids throughout western Nevada in Tertiary time.