The fate of kyanite in ultrahigh-pressure metasedimentary rocks, southwestern Tianshan, NW China

Abstract

Kyanite, an aluminous phase common in high- to medium-pressure metapelitic rocks, is critical in revealing complex tectonometamorphic histories of orogenic belts. So far it has not been documented in the well-established low-temperature – ultrahigh-pressure (LT-UHP) metamorphic belt of Chinese southwestern Tianshan. By detailed petrographic investigations, kyanite is recognized as minute inclusions or porphyroblasts in two different types of metasedimentary rocks. In omphacite-garnet phengite schists of the Habutengsu area, kyanite only forms needles associated with acicular phengite and lawsonite (pseudomorphed by paragonite and clinozoisite), and coesite (or its pseudomorph) in the extremely low-Ca core domain of well-zoned garnet. The acicular inclusion assemblage in garnet cores probably witnessed large overstepping of peak-stage reactions in metapelitic rocks in a cold subduction zone. The absence of matrix kyanite in this rock type may be ascribed to elevated Na and Ca activities during the growth of high-Ca garnet rim. This is supported by the common presence of sodic and calcic phases (e.g., paragonite and omphacite) in the matrix or the garnet rim domain, with absence in garnet core. In a suite of calcschists of the Muzhaerte area, kyanite occurs as a matrix and/or inclusion phase. In relatively fresh, less foliated chloritoid-ankerite calcschists, kyanite is a major matrix phase with coesite inclusions and locally surrounded by prophyroblasts or fine-grained aggregates of both paragonite and phengite. In altered chlorite-white mica calcschists, kyanite is rarely embedded in white mica aggregates but commonly enclosed in Fe-rich chloritoid porphyroblasts. The mantling of ankerite by acicular to prismatic Fe-rich chloritoid suggests locally increased Fe2+ activity and Al transport by fluids along grain boundaries. The common white mica corona around kyanite in the calcschists suggests elevated Na and/or K activities postdating kyanite formation. Outcrop-scale variations of kyanite textures and whole-rock alkali element contents support the infiltration of Na- and/or K-bearing fluids, probably a dominant mechanism responsible for the lack of kyanite in the Tianshan UHP metasedimentary rocks. P-T estimates suggest the kyanite corrosion took place at 15–21 kbar and 530–610 °C, corresponding to the early exhumation stage. This study suggests that kyanite may be a major peak phase of the Tianshan UHP metasedimentary rocks, and the complete understanding of its prograde evolution is a prerequisite to unravel the fate of subducted sediments and their chemical geodynamics in cold subduction zones.