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6th International Archean Symposium
6th International Archean Symposium

Archean tectonic processes from seismic reflection surveys of the Superior, Yilgarn, and Pilbara cratons

Oral

Talk Description

Following deep seismic reflections surveys on the Yilgarn and Pilbara cratons by Geoscience Australia with the Geological Survey of Western Australia and on the Superior Craton by the Canadian Lithoprobe program, these cratons are now some of the best surveyed Archean regions on Earth. We present seismic images that highlight how variations in crustal architecture relate to differences in Archean tectonic processes between cratons. All cratons are characterized by a mostly non-reflective 4-12 km thick uppermost crust due to the presence of large granitoid plutons and gneissic domains. Localised regions of upper crustal seismic reflectivity are typically interpreted as supracrustal rocks and mafic sills or faults and shear zones. The middle and lower Archean crust contains variably complex geometries of relatively high amplitude reflections, though in some regions such as the Eastern Goldfields Superterrane and the Abitibi Greenstone Belt the lower crust appears less reflective than the middle crust. Crustal thicknesses vary from 30 km in the eastern Pilbara to 35-40 km across much of the Yilgarn and Superior, though thicknesses as great as 45-52 km occur locally in the latter two cratons. The characteristics of the Archean crust-mantle boundary, or Moho, which is commonly well-defined, differs between cratons, indicating significant variations in the tectonic processes that have driven the final stages of crustal evolution. Dipping reflections in the uppermost mantle linked to convergent crustal structures are interpreted as relict subduction scars. In the southern Superior Craton, Moho offsets and north-dipping reflections in the middle and lower crust arose through successive underthrusting of Meso-Neoarchean island arcs, oceanic plateaux, and micro-continental fragments, as they accreted against a pre-existing northern nucleus, e.g. North Caribou and Opatica terranes. Seismic reflection lines reveal a doubly-vergent orogen above north-dipping mantle reflections that indicate subduction-drive accretion. Post-orogenic crustal extension, which is inferred from crustal-scale normal shear zones and dropped greenstone belts, has not erased the original accretionary crustal architecture. In contrast, in the Yilgarn Craton interior, accretionary structures are less clear, and there are no prominent offsets in the Moho. In the Youanmi Terrane, which represents the cratonic nucleus, a pervasive fabric of listric east-dipping mid-crustal reflections soles out into the upper part of subhorizontal lower crustal reflections. We interpret this reflective fabric to be the result of widespread crustal collapse during the late stage of craton evolution at ~2.65-2.6 Ga that also produced subsidence of the upper crust. Though terrane boundaries can be identified in seismic data across the Eastern Goldfields Superterrane, these boundaries have commonlybeen modified by extension, which also overprinted any accretionary lower crustal structures, perhaps simultaneous with widespread intrusion of post-tectonic melts. Exhumation of moderately reflective, amphibolite to granulite facies crust in the Narryer Terrane above dipping mantle reflectors indicate that shortening along the northwest edge of the Yilgarn Craton was subduction-driven. In the eastern Pilbara Craton, shallowly dipping to subhorizontal reflections in the middle and lower crust preclude crustal-scale vertical tectonic movements, and imply that the vertical displacements inferred from surface mapping were largely confined to the upper crust.

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