Did Patagonia collide against Gondwana in the Late Paleozoic? Some Insights From Magnetic Fabrics of Granitoids in the North Patagonian Massif

RAPALINI, A.E., M.G.LOPEZ DE LUCHI, TOMEZZOLI, R.

San Francisco?

Congreso; American Geophysical Union, Meeting; 2008

AGU

The Paleozoic tectonic evolution of Patagonia has been a matter of much debate in the last two decades. There is no consensus on whether the North Patagonian Massif (NPM) was accreted by a frontal collision to Gondwana or if it shared a similar paleotectonic evolution with other Gondwana blocks during the Paleozoic. Different geologic, geochronologic, geophysical and structural data have been interpreted either as supporting or refuting the collisional model. Paleomagnetic data obtained so far is consistent with an authochtonous evolution since the Devonian, but it does not rule out relative displacements of up to 1500 km between Patagonia and Gondwana.Therefore, a Late Paleozoic frontal collision cannot be definitely ruled out on the basis of paleomagnetic data alone. As part of a muldisciplinary research project a magnetic fabric study, by means of the anisotropy of magnetic susceptibility (AMS), was carried out on Late Paleozoic granitoids exposed in northeastern NPM. Two main composite units were studied, the highly to variably foliated Yaminue Complex, poorly dated as Late Carboniferous and ranging in composition from tonalite to leuco-granite, and the much less deformed granodiorites to monzoganites of the Early Permian (283 Ma) Navarrete complex. While the former is composed of both ferro and paramagnetic units, with a dominance of the latter; the Navarrete plutons are basically ferromagnetic. Directional and scalar AMS results joined with meso and microstructural studies permitted the characterization of the deformational and magmatic fabric of the different units. An evolutionary picture of the succesive intrusive events in NPM emerged which confirms an important NNE-SSW contractional event associated with intrusion of the different units that compose the Yaminue Complex. This event ended before the intrusion of the Navarrete Complex, which is governed by a different stress regime. Our results fit the hypothesis of a collisional event affecting northern Patagonia in the Late Paleozoic. This event was over by 283 Ma.