Late Cretaceous provenance change in the Jiaolai Basin, East China: Implications for paleogeographic evolution of East Asia

Abstract

East China experienced crustal extensions during the Early Cretaceous and the latest Cretaceous-Cenozoic. For a long time, previous studies have recognized a short-lived compressional event between these two extensional regimes during the early Late Cretaceous but not much attention has been paid to it, although it may shed new light on the tectonic evolution of East Asia and the mechanism of the North China Craton Destruction. The Jiaolai Basin, located at the margin of East China, consists of a thick succession of Cretaceous sedimentary rocks and thus may help in further interpreting the mechanism and influence of the short-lived compressional event. Here, we apply integrated sedimentological methods to sandstone samples of both the Lower Cretaceous Laiyang Group and Upper Cretaceous Wangshi Group. Our findings suggest that there was a provenance change in the Jiaolai Basin from the Early Cretaceous granitic and metamorphic rock origin to the Late Cretaceous basic-intermediate volcanic origin. Combined with the zircon U-Pb ages, we conclude that the provenance change was caused by the uplift of the coastal mountains along the East Asian margin, from the relatively distal Sulu orogenic belt and Jiaobei Terrane during the Early Cretaceous to the intra-basinal volcanic rocks of the Qingshan Groupduring the Late Cretaceous. After careful evaluation of the provenance histories, orogenic exhumations, widespread unconformities and paleoclimate changes that occurred in sedimentary basins both along the East Asian margin and in the hinterland, we finally estimate the possible range of influence and extent of the short-lived compression event during the early Late Cretaceous.