Oxygen isotope fractionation and disequilibrium displayed by some granulite facies rocks from the Fraser Range, Western Australia

Abstract

The granulites of the Fraser Range are assumed to have formed in a carbon-rich fluid, and are generally devoid of hornblende, and lack obvious hydrous retrograde features. In these granulites, pyroxene, garnet, plagioclase and quartz are the minerals most likely to retain the oxygen isotope ratios fixed at an early stage of initial granulite metamorphism. Temperature estimates using these minerals commonly suggest that oxygen isotopic exchange ceased in the range 600 to 680°C. The peak metamorphic temperature was probably ∼ 850°C as based on the stability fields of the coexisting minerals and some cation temperatures from coexisting pyroxenes in these rocks. Ilmenite may be slightly out of isotopic equilibrium with the other minerals. Thus, grains of quartz, feldspar, pyroxene and ilmenite have suffered considerable oxygen isotopic exchange during the retrogressive phase of the metamorphism, in spite of the fact that very little water was present in these granulites. The observed deviation from the peak metamorphic temperatures can be explained by essentially closed system solid-state diffusion (on at least a scale of centimetres) during slow cooling of the rocks from ~850 to 650°C, followed by more rapid cooling down to ∼ 300°C. Such an explanation is not at variance with the radiometric data available for rocks from the area, which suggest that the latter phase could have involved uplift rates of ≳0.5 mm/yr for a period of about 40 Ma. Wholerock δ18O values on non-quartzose mafic granulites, about 7.2%., fall within the range of basalts affected by seafloor weathering.