Geochemistry of middle Tertiary volcanic rocks in the northern Aquarius Mountains, west-central Arizona
The northern Aquarius Mountains volcanic field ([approximately]50km east of Kingman) covers an area of 400 km[sup 2], bounded by upper Trout Creek (S), the Truxton Valley (N), the Big Sandy Valley (W), and Cross Mountain (E). The volcanic sequence rests upon a pre-middle Eocene erosional surface. The lowest units is a 250 m-thick unit of rhyolitic pyroclastic breccias and airfall tuffs. Successively younger units are: basanite flows and cinder cones; hornblende latite flows and domes; porphyritic dacite flows, domes, and breccias; alkali basalt intrusions; and low-silica rhyolite domes and small high=silica rhyolite flows. Dacite is volumetrically dominant, and erupted primarily from vents in and around Cedar Basin (Penitentiary Mtn 7.5[prime] quad.). Other geologists have obtained K-Ar dates [approximately]24--20 Ma for the basanites and latites. The alkali basalts, latites, dacites, and rhyolites evidently constitute a genetically-related high-K to shoshonitic calcalkaline suite with chemistry typical of subduction-related magmatism: enrichment in LILE and LREE, and depletion of Nb and Ta relative to K and La and of Ti relative to Hf and Yb. Each rock type is unique and distinguishable in K/Rb and Rb/Sr. The basanites are primitive (mg=0.75--0.78), have intraplate affinities (La/Nb[<=]1), and show consistent and distinctive depletion of K relative to the other LILE. The presence of these basanites in an early Miocene volcanic sequence is unusual or unexpected, as they predate (by [approximately]10 m.y.) the regional eruption of asthenosphere-derived basalts associated with Basin-and-Range extension.
- OSTI ID:
- 5097530
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-9305259-; CODEN: GAAPBC
- Journal Information:
- Geological Society of America, Abstracts with Programs; (United States), Vol. 25:5; Conference: 89. annual meeting of the Cordilleran Section and the 46th annual meeting of the Rocky Mountain Section of the Geological Society of America (GSA), Reno, NV (United States), 19-21 May 1993; ISSN 0016-7592
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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Related Subjects
ARIZONA
GEOLOGIC DEPOSITS
GEOCHEMISTRY
ISOTOPE DATING
VOLCANIC ROCKS
ARGON ISOTOPES
CHEMICAL COMPOSITION
POTASSIUM ISOTOPES
TERTIARY PERIOD
TUFF
AGE ESTIMATION
ALKALI METAL ISOTOPES
CENOZOIC ERA
CHEMISTRY
DEVELOPED COUNTRIES
GEOLOGIC AGES
IGNEOUS ROCKS
ISOTOPES
NORTH AMERICA
ROCKS
USA
580000* - Geosciences