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Fluid flow in marbles at Jervois, central Australia: oxygen isotope disequilibrium and zoning produced by decoupling of mineralogical and isotopic resetting

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Abstract

The Jervois region of the Arunta Inlier, central Australia, contains para- and orthogneisses that underwent low-pressure amphibolite facies metamorphism (P = 200–300 MPa, T = 520–600 °C). Marble layers cut by metre-wide quartz + garnet ± epidote veins comprise calcite, quartz, epidote, clinopyroxene, grandite garnet, and locally wollastonite. The marbles also contain locally discordant decimetre-thick garnet and epidote skarn layers. The mineral assemblages imply that the rocks were infiltrated by water-rich fluids (XCO2 = 0.1–0.3) at ∼600 °C. The fluids were probably derived from the quartz-garnet vein systems that represent conduits for fluids exsolved from crystallizing pegmatites emplaced close to the metamorphic peak. At one locality, the marble has calcite (Cc) δ18O values of 9–18‰ and garnet (Gnt) δ18O values of 10–14‰. The δ18O(Gnt) values are only poorly correlated with δ18O(Cc), and the δ18O values of some garnet cores are higher than the rims. The isotopic disequilibrium indicates that garnet grew before the δ18O values of the rock were reset. The marbles contain  ≤15% garnet and, for water-rich fluids, garnet-forming reactions are predicted to propagate faster than O-isotopes are reset. The Sm-Nd and Pb-Pb ages of garnets imply that fluid flow occurred at 1750–1720 Ma. There are no significant age differences between garnet cores and rims, suggesting that fluid flow was relatively rapid. Texturally late epidote has δ18O values of 1.5–6.2‰ implying δ18O(H2O) values of 2–7‰. Waters with such low-δ18O values are probably at least partly meteoric in origin, and the epidote may be recording the late influx of meteoric water into a cooling hydrothermal system.

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Received: 29 April 1996 / Accepted: 12 March 1997

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Cartwright, I., Buick, I. & Maas, R. Fluid flow in marbles at Jervois, central Australia: oxygen isotope disequilibrium and zoning produced by decoupling of mineralogical and isotopic resetting. Contrib Mineral Petrol 128, 335–351 (1997). https://doi.org/10.1007/s004100050313

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s004100050313

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