Abstract
For a long time, the thermal history of northeastern (NE) Fennoscandia in the Phanerozoic and Precambrian remained unknown, since no thermochronological studies were carried out within the Kola Peninsula area. Two years ago, we developed the first model of tectono-thermal evolution of the Kola Peninsula territory for the last 1.9 Gyr using a set of newly obtained apatite fission-track (AFT) and Ar/Ar thermochronological data. However, the low-temperature history of the most ancient tectonic unit of the northeastern part of the Kola Peninsula—the Archean Murmansk craton—remained poorly constrained due to the lack of AFT data. In this paper, we present the first results of AFT studies of 14 samples representing intrusive and metamorphic Precambrian rocks, located within the Murmansk craton of NE Fennoscandia. AFT ages and track length distributions indicate a similar tectono-thermal evolution of Precambrian tectonic units in NE Fennoscandia over the last 300 Myr. The AFT ages are distributed between ca. 177 and ca. 384 Ma; their median value, ~293 Ma, confirms the presence of a previously identified hidden thermal event that took place at about 300 Ma. However, a detailed analysis of the AFT age distribution shows the presence of three statistically distinguishable age components: 180–190 Ma (C1), 290–320 Ma (C2) and 422 Ma (C3). We assume that the relatively young AFT ages of C1 may originate from apatite crystals with low thermal resistivity. Remarkably, this value coincides with the initial stage of the Barents Sea magmatic province activity during large-scale plume-lithospheric interaction, as well as with the assumed age of an enigmatic remagnetization event throughout the Kola Peninsula. C2 ages can be observed in both the gabbroic and non-gabbroic samples, whereas C3 ages can only be found in gabbro. It is supposed that C2 ages, similarly to the Central Kola terrane, correspond to a cooling event related to the denudation of a thick sedimentary cover, representing a continuation of the Caledonian foreland basin towards NE Fennoscandia. C3 ages may be associated with a thermal event corresponding to the Caledonian collisional orogeny.
Highlights
The need for thermal history reconstruction in NE Fennoscandia within the Kola Peninsula area was formulated for the first time in [1]
The obtained apatite fission-track (AFT) ages of most samples are statistically indistinguishable within 1σ uncertainty, with an exception of sample #11 (639-3)
The obtained results are in an agreement with the previous ones from the Kola Peninsula (Figure 2) and indicate a similar post-Devonian tectono-thermal history of the Central Kola terrane and Murmansk craton. This conclusion is supported by the t-T models of the studied samples (Figure 3), which indicate that, apart from a few exceptions that will be discussed below, the thermal evolution of the Murmansk craton is in general agreement with the previously proposed models for the thermal evolution of the Kola Peninsula
Summary
The need for thermal history reconstruction in NE Fennoscandia within the Kola Peninsula area was formulated for the first time in [1]. Up to now there have been no known thermal or magmatic events of this age within the Kola Peninsula area in general and the Murmansk craton in particular. Fission-track (FT) analysis is a sensitive low-temperature thermochronological method that is widely used to construct quantitative models of the thermal and tectonic evolution of various tectonic units [5]. Systematic low-temperature thermochronological studies were urgently needed in order to develop a quantitative model of the tectono-thermal evolution of northeast Fennoscandia. It consists of tonalite–trondhjemite–granodiorite from the Sredniy Peninsula to the east (Figure 1).
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