Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7fkt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T18:13:37.610Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Low-pressure corona textures between olivine and plagioclase in unmetamorphosed gabbros from Black Hill, South Australia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 July 2018

Simon P. Turner
Affiliation:
Department of Geology and Geophysics, University of Adelaide GPO Box 498, Adelaide, South Australia 5001
Kurt Stüwe
Affiliation:
Department of Geology and Geophysics, University of Adelaide GPO Box 498, Adelaide, South Australia 5001

Abstract

Olivine-plagioclase corona textures occur in ophitic to sub-ophitic olivine gabbros at Black Hill, South Australia. Contrasting with many corona and symplectite textures previously described, these do not involve spinel or garnet as reaction products and did not form under high-pressure conditions. Rather, the coronas formed at no more than 1 kbar pressure and are composed of a shell of orthopyroxene around the olivine often succeeded by a shell of amphibole or occasionally biotite. Beyond this, a vermicular symplectite of anorthite containing orthopyroxene and rarer amphibole vermicules extends out to host plagioclase of labradorite composition. Textural relations are used to infer a subsolidus igneous origin for all but the orthopyroxene shell which may have formed in the presence of some magma. Compositional zonation is absent from all the constituent phases except the amphibole shell which is strongly zoned in Mg# and may have a late origin. An average maximum corona width of 150- 200 μm indicates a limiting distance for subsolidus chemical diffusion. The corona products involve the reactants olivine and plagioclase in the proportions 1:3 and symplectite formation may have been promoted by a Na potential gradient. The system must also have been open to minor components including H2O and TiO2, with H2O possibly being derived from a hydrothermal system. Such systems may have been set up in the country rocks on intrusion of the magma and subsequently collapsed inwards into the pluton during sub-solidus cooling.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Mineralogical Society of Great Britain and Ireland 1992

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*

Present address: Department of Earth Sciences, Open University, Milton Keynes, MK7 6AA, England.

References

Ashworth, J. R. (1986) The role of magmatic reaction, diffnsion and annealing in the evolution of coronitic microstructure in troctolitic gabbro from Risör, Norway: a discussion. Mineral Mag., 50, 469–73.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blundy, J. D. and Holland, T. J. B. (1990) Calcic amphibole equilibria and a new amphibole-plagio-clasc geothcrmometer. Contrib. Mineral. Petrol., 104, 208–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Campbell, I. H. and Nolan, J. (1974) Factors effecting the stability field of Ca-poor pyroxene and the origin of the Ca-poor minimum in Ca-rich pyroxenes from tholeiitic intrusions. Ibid., 48, 205–19.Google Scholar
Ellis, D. J. (1980) Osumilite-sapphirine-quartz granu-lites from Enderby Land, Antarctica: P-T conditions of metamorphism, implications for garnet-cordierite equilibria and the evolution of the deep crust. Ibid., 74, 201–10.Google Scholar
Helz, R. T. (1982) Phase relations and compositions of amphiboles produced in studies of the melting behaviour of rocks. In Amphiboles: Petrology and Phase Relations (Veblen, D. R. and Ribbe, P. H., eds.), Min. Soc. Am. Reviews in Mineralogy, 9B, 279-354.Google Scholar
Joesten, R. (1986a) The role of magmatic reaction, diffusion and annealing in the evolution of coronitic microstructure in troctolitic gabbro from Ris6r, Norway. Mineral Mag., 50, 441–67.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Joesten, R. (1986b) Reply. Mineral Mag., 50, 474–9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Johnson, C. D. and Carlson, W. D. (1990) The origin of olivine-plagioclase coronas in metagabbros from the Adriondack Mountains, New York, J. Met. Geol., 8, 697717.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kushiro, I. (1969) The system forsterite-diopsidc-silica with and without water at high pressures. Am. J. Sci., 267, 269–94.Google Scholar
Monkoltip, P., and Ashworth, J. R. (1983) Quantitative estimation of an open system symplectite forming reaction: Restricted diffusion of A1 and Si in coronas around olivine. J. Petrol., 24, 635–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nishiyama, T. (1983) Steady state diffusion model for olivine-plagioclase corona growth. Geochim. Cos-mochim. Aeta., 47, 283–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Turner, S. P. (1992) Petrology of Late-orogenic layered gabbros, potassic monzonites and A-type grano-phyres from Black Hill, South Australia. J. Petrol. (submitted).Google Scholar
van Lamoen, H. (1979) Coronas in olivine gabbros and iron ores from Susimäki and Riuttamaa, Finland. Contrib. Mineral. Petrol., 68, 259-68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar