What is it about?
At 15.5 and 13.5 Ma SW Japan experienced an unusual episode of magmatism. A great diversity of magmas intruded the accretionary wedge in front of the subduction zone. This begs the question: what was melting? There are two proposals: the accretionary wedge itself was melting or, alternatively, a hidded deep crustal segment was melting. In this paper we explore the possibility to explore this question using xenocrystal zircon, i.e. zircon crystals that did not crystallize from the magma but we picked up by the magma either in the melting zone (the source region of the magmas) or were entrained in the magmas on their way to the surface or upper crustal levels.
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Why is it important?
Solving the question of the source area of the magmas will help to constrain the composition of the crust below the outcrops of the igneous rocks and thus lead to a better understanding of the evolution of that crust (e.g., has there been a collision?)
Perspectives
The study made use of our own very small data set and explored a much larger dataset already published but not evaluated with respect of the question "what can xenocrystal zircons tell us"
Dr. Ulrich Knittel
Resource Petrology, RWTH Aachen University
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Zircon Systematics of the Shionomisaki Volcano–Plutonic Complex (Kii Peninsula, Japan): A Potential Tool for the Study of the Source Region of Silicic Magmas, Minerals, May 2025, MDPI AG,
DOI: 10.3390/min15050537.
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