Regional kinematics inferred from magnetic subfabrics in Archean rocks of Northern Ontario, Canada

Abstract

Strain analysis, observations of L-S fabrics and studies of the anisotropy of magnetic susceptibility (AMS) and of anisotropy of isothermal remanence (AIRM) reveal a sequence of progressive fabric development during regional deformation. L-S fabrics of quartz and feldspar grains are most transposed in regional transpression whereas the AMS subfabrics, controlled by the properties of late metamorphic silicates, record a later orientation of the ambient stress field. Anisotropy of magnetic remanence is caused by the still younger minerals, magnetite and pyrrhotite. Its anisotropy is less transposed than the AMS subfabric. Consequently the relative orientations of the three types of fabric yield a kinematic sequence of subfabrics developed during transpression. The L-S fabrics are most transposed, the AMS less transposed and the AIRM fabrics least transposed toward the plane of regional flattening. The results indicate that the deformation recorded by the three subfabrics was non-coaxial in the most general sense, with all three principal directions spinning with respect to the rocks during progressive straining.