Seventh Annual V. M. Goldschmidt Conference
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CRUSTAL HISTORY AND PROCESSES AS REFLECTED IN Pb ISOTOPIC
SIGNATURES: SOME EXAMPLES FROM NORTH AMERICA
WOODEN, J.L., MS 937, U.S. Geological Survey, 345 Middlefield Rd., Menlo Park, CA
94025, jwooden@mojave.wr.usgs.gov
The nature and timing of, and processes
involved with, crust formation and the extraction
of the crust from the Earth's mantle remain
subjects of much debate. The Pb isotopic system
is one of several isotopic systems that have been
used to help understand the processes of crust
formation and has the advantage of being based
on 3 parent-daughter systems with very different
decay rates and 2 elemental pairs (U/Pb and
Th/Pb) with different geochemical properties.
Early studies of crustal Pb isotopic systematics
(e.g. Oversby, 1978) established that by the late
Archean, crustal provinces existed with distinct
Pb isotopic signatures. Additional work has
confirmed these distinctions and emphasized the
wide range in characteristics for different crustal
regions. For example a region such as the
Wyoming Province requires an early stage with
high U/Pb but a second stage with low U/Pb and
high Th/Pb and Th/U. In contrast regions such as
the southern Superior Province or Greenland and
Labrador require primary and secondary stages
with low U/Pb and Th/Pb. These variations in
Pb isotopic signatures indicate a significant range
in U/Pb, Th/Pb, and Th/U in the sources of the
crust and/or significant variation, including
elemental fractionation, in the processes by which
crust was formed. Since the extremes of these
variations exist in some of the oldest surviving
crustal regions (3.9-4.0 Ga), the implication is
that processes operating in the first 0.5 Ga of
Earth history must have created heterogeneities in
U/Pb, Th/Pb and Th/U in significant volumes of
the upper mantle.
Crust of all ages can have distinctive Pb
isotopic signatures that are very useful in the
definition of crustal provinces and for
understanding the tectonics of crustal
amalgamation. Such a situation exists in the SW
US where Pb isotopic data define three
Proterozoic crustal provinces, Mojave, Yavapai,
and Mazatzal, and a probable tectonically-
generated transition zone between the Mojave
and Yavapai provinces. The initial Pb isotopic
2144.
composition of the Yavapai crustal province
indicates an oceanic mantle-like source, but
Yavapai crustal rocks have higher U/Pb and
lower Th/Pb and Th/U than average crustal
values (Stacey-Kramers model). Mazatzal crust
has the same initial Pb isotopic composition as
Yavapai crust implying a common ultimate
source, but U/Pb, Th/Pb and Th/U equal to
average crustal values, perhaps implying a
fundamental difference in the overall processes of
crust formation. Mojave crust has a more
radiogenic initial Pb isotopic composition than
Yavapai and Mazatzal crust, and lower U/Pb and
much higher Th/Pb and Th/U than average
crustal values. Although most of the exposed
Mojave Precambrian rocks are the same age as
those in Yavapai and Mazatzal crustal provinces,
the Mojave province may involve a significant
amount of late Archean and earliest Proterozoic
crustal materials. The distinction in elemental
ratios may imply some fundamental processes
differed from those involved in crust formation in
either the Yavapai or Mazatzal province.
Pb isotopic data are also valuable in analyzing
crust formation in modern magmatic arc
environments. The largely marginal continental
magmatic arcs of Mesozoic age in the western
US from Washington to southern California
share a surprising number of Pb isotopic features
in spite of their development in association with
cratonic regions of widely varying age and
isotopic character. All three Pb isotopic ratios
increase systematically from W-E with the least
radiogenic values approaching ocean island-like
values and show a strong positive correlation
with ISr. Pb-Pb isotopic plots appear to represent
two component mixing at the gross scale.
Clearly the processes and volume of magma
involved in these arc magmatic environments are
capable of minimizing the differences in the
continental input to these systems.