New detrital zircon geochronological results from the Meso-Neoproterozoic sandstones in the southern-eastern Liaoning region, North China craton, and their paleogeographic implications

Abstract

We present new detrital zircon U–Pb and Hf isotopic dating results from the late Mesoproterozoic to early Neoproterozoic sandstones exposed in the southern-eastern Liaoning Province, eastern North China craton (NCC). The Qiaotou Formation (Fm) in the Benxi and Dalian regions yield similar detrital zircon age patterns characterized by peaks around ∼1750 Ma, ∼1600 Ma, ∼1175 Ma and ∼1100 Ma. The Kangjia Fm in the Benxi region and the Changlingzi Fm in the Dalian region share similar detrital zircon age patterns, which in combination with their similarities in stratigraphic sequences and lithologic associations, suggest that they are correlative rock units. Based on the detrital zircon dating results and U–Pb ages of mafic sills intruding the strata, we suggest that the Qiaotou Fm is younger than ∼1077 Ma and older than ∼948 Ma, and the age of the Kangjia and Changlingzi formations is between ∼1111 Ma and ∼924 Ma. We synthesize the new data with detrital zircon age and Hf isotopic data reported in the region and other Meso-Neoproterozoic basins in the eastern NCC and suggest that Grenville-age (∼1300–1000 Ma) detrital zircons widely discovered in those strata might be transformed from other cratons. The possibility that those non-NCC provenance detrital zircons might be sourced from the Baltica, São Francisco–Congo and Laurentia cratons existed. But the former two solutions that the NCC directly connected to either of those cratons are contradictory to the global paleogeographic reconstruction context of supercontinent Rodinia. The Grenvillian and Sveconorwegian orogenic belts on Laurentia–Baltica conjoined continents are more likely the sediment provenance of non-NCC Grenville-age detrital zircon provenance in the Meso-Neoproterozoic basins in eastern NCC in the configuration context of the possible NCC–NW Laurentia conjugation in Rodinia.