Illite crystallinity study of the Cretaceous Shimanto Belt in the Akaishi Mountains, eastern Southwest Japan

Abstract

Abstract Illite crystallinity (IC) analyses in the Upper Cretaceous Shimanto accretionary complex of the southern Akaishi Mountains, eastern Southwest Japan confirm the applicability of this technique for evaluating the grade of diagenesis/metamorphism in a sediment‐dominated accretionary complex. Reproducibility analyses of IC values show a variance of about 15% from the mean. Data from three traverses, which transect across‐strike sections of ∼25 km, clearly demonstrate that the IC distributions have specific overall trends. The IC values belong to the lQwer anchizone and the zone of diagenesis. The IC distributions may be controlled locally by structural features, but there are no distinct relationships with regional‐scale geological structures. This may indicate that the heterogeneous geothermal rise affected the pre‐existing structural and diagenetic/metamorphic framework of the accretionary sequence. Along‐strike variations of grade tend to increase toward the northeast where a Middle Miocene granitoid occurs. Hence, the original diagenetic/metamorphic framework of this part of the Shimanto Belt was presumably overprinted during the Middle Miocene.