Late Cenozoic Uguumur and Bod-Uul Volcanic Centers in Northern Mongolia: Mineralogy, Geochemistry, and Magma Sources

Abstract

The paper presents new data on mineralogy, geochemistry, and Sr-Nd-Pb isotope systematics of Late Cenozoic eruption products of Uguumur and Bod-Uul volcanoes in the Tesiingol field of Northern Mongolia, with implications for the magma generation conditions, magma sources, and geodynamic causes of volcanism. The lavas and pyroclastics of the two volcanic centers are composed of basanite, phonotephrite, basaltic trachyandesite, and trachyandesite, which enclose spinel and garnet peridotite and garnet-bearing pyroxenite xenoliths; megacrysts of Na-sanidine, Ca-Na pyroxene, ilmenite, and almandine-grossular-pyrope garnets; and carbonate phases. The rocks are enriched in LILE and HFSE, show strongly fractioned REE spectra, and are relatively depleted in U and Th. The low contents of U and Th in Late Cenozoic volcanics from Northern and Central Mongolia represent the composition of a magma source. The presence of carbonate phases in subliquidus minerals and mantle rocks indicates that carbon-bearing fluids were important agents in metasomatism of subcontinental lithospheric mantle. The silicate-carbonate melts were apparently released from eclogitizied slabs during the Paleo-Asian and Mongol-Okhotsk subduction. The parent alkali-basaltic magma may be derived as a result from partial melting of Grt-bearing pyroxenite or eclogite-like material or carobantized peridotite. The sources of alkali-basaltic magmas from the Northern and Central Mongolia plot different isotope trends corresponding to two different provinces. The isotope signatures of megacrysts are similar to those of studied volcanic centers rocks. The P-T conditions inferred for the crystallization of pyroxene and garnet megacrysts correspond to a depth range from the Grt-Sp phase transition to the lower crust. Late Cenozoic volcanism in Northern and Central Mongolia may be a response to stress propagation and gravity instability in the mantle associated with the India-Asia collision.