The generation and crystallization conditions of the Proterozoic Harney Peak Leucogranite, Black Hills, South Dakota, USA: Petrologic and geochemical constraints

Abstract

The mineralogy, petrology and geochemistry of the Proterozoic Harney Peak Granite, Black Hills, South Dakota, were examined in view of experimentally determined phase equilibria applicable to granitic systems in order to place constraints on the progenesis of peraluminous leucogranites and commonly associated rare-element pegmatites. The granite was emplaced at 3–4 kbar as multiple sills and dikes into quartz-mica schists at the culmination of a regional high-temperature, low-pressure metamorphic event. Principally along the periphery of the main pluton and in satellite intrusions, the sills segregated into granite-pegmatite couplets. The major minerals include quartz, K-feldspar, sodic plagioclase and muscovite. Biotite-{Mg No. [Molar MgO/(MgO+FeO)]=0.32-0.38} is the predominant ferromagnesian mineral in the granite's core, whereas at the periphery of the main pluton and in the satellite intrusions tourmaline (Mg No.=0.18–0.48) is the dominant ferromagnesian phase. Almandine-spessartine garnet is also found in the outer intrusions. There is virtually a complete overlap in the wide concentration ranges of SiO2, CaO, MgO, FeO, Sr, Zr, W of the biotite- and tourmaline-bearing granite suites with no discernable differentiation trends on Harker diagrams, precluding the derivation of one suite from the other by differentiation following emplacement. This is consistent with the oxygen isotope compositions which are 11.5 ± 0.6‰ for the biotite granites and 13.2 ± 0.8‰ for the tourmaline granites, suggesting derivation from different sources. The concentrations of TiO2 and possibly Ba are higher and of MnO and B are lower in the biotite granites. The normative Orthoclase/Albite ratio is extremely variable ranging from 0.26 to 1.65 in the biotite granites to 0.01–1.75 in the tourmaline granites. Very few sample compositions fall near the high-pressure, watersaturated haplogranite minima-eutectic trend, indicating that the granites for the most part are not minimum melts generated under conditions with \(a_{{\text{H}}_{\text{2}} {\text{O}}}\)=1. Instead, most biotite granites are more potassic than the water-saturated minima and eutectics and in analogy with experimentally produced granitic melts, they are best explained by melting at ∼6 kbar, \(a_{{\text{H}}_{\text{2}} {\text{O}}}\)<1 and temperatures ∼800°C. Such high temperatures are also indicated by oxygen isotope equilibration among the constituent minerals (Nabelek et al. 1992). Several of the tourmaline granite samples contain virtually no K-feldspar and have oxygen isotope equilibration temperatures 716–775°C. Therefore, they must represent high-temperature accumulations of liquidus minerals crystallized under equilibrium conditions from melts more sodic than the water-saturated haplogranite minima or during fractionation of intruded melts into granite-pegmatite couplets accompanied by volatile-aided differentiation of the alkali elements. The indicated high temperatures, \(a_{{\text{H}}_{\text{2}} {\text{O}}}\)<1, the relatively high TiO2 and Ba concentrations and the relatively low \(\partial ^{18} {\text{O}}\) values of the biotite granites suggest that they were generated by high-extent, biotite-dehydration melting of an immature Archean metasedimentary source. The ascent of the hot melts may have triggered low-extent, muscovite-dehydration melting of schists higher in the crust producing the high-B, low-Ti melts comprising the periphery of the main pluton and the satellite intrusions. Alternatively, the different granite types may be the result of melting of a vertical section of the crust in response to the ascent of a thermal pulse, with the low-\(\partial ^{18} {\text{O}}\) biotite granites generated at a deeper, hotter region and the high-\(\partial ^{18} {\text{O}}\) tourmaline granites at a higher, cooler region of the crust. The low-Ti and high-B concentrations in the high-\(\partial ^{18} {\text{O}}\) melts resulted in the crystallization of tourmaline rather than biotite, which promoted the observed differentiation of the melts into the granitic and pegmatitic layers found along the periphery of the main pluton and the satellite intrusions.