The discovery of the Neoarchean mafic dyke swarm in Hengshan and reinterpretation of the previous “Wutai greenstone belt”

Abstract

The structural mapping and section study indicate that the “greenstone belts” in the southern to central parts of Hengshan were intensively sheared and transposed mafic dyke swarm, which originally intruded into the Neoarchean grey gneiss and high-pressure granulite terrain (HPGT). The HPGT is characterized by flat-dipping structures, to the south it became steep and was cut by the Dianmen mafic dyke swarm. After high-pressure granulite-facies metamorphic event, the mafic dyke swarm occurred, and was associated with the extensional setting and reworked by the late strike-slip shearing. The zircon age dating proves that the Dianmen mafic dyke swarm was emplaced during the period between 2499±4 Ma and 2512±3 Ma, followed by late tectonothermal reworking. The Dianmen mafic dyke swarm further documents the extensional episode in the central to northern parts of North China Craton (NCC), providing the important constraint for the limit between Archean and Proterozoic and correlation between NCC and other cratonic blocks of the world.