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Elsevier, Gondwana Research, 2(23), p. 748-758, 2013

DOI: 10.1016/j.gr.2012.05.016

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Deep conductivity structure beneath the northern Brasília belt, central Brazil: Evidence for a Neoproterozoic arc-continent collision

Journal article published in 2013 by Antonio L. Padilha ORCID, Icaro Vitorello, Marcelo B. Pádua
This paper is available in a repository.
This paper is available in a repository.

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Abstract

The Brasília belt, in central Brazil, experienced a broad range of tectonic events, including several periods of compressional and extensional deformations during the Proterozoic. Magnetotelluric data were collected at 27 sites along a profile crossing the northern part of the belt. Strike analysis and distortion decomposition in-dicated that most of the data are two-dimensional (2D) and fit a regional geoelectric strike angle of N20E, parallel to the tectonic grain. 2D conductivity model is constrained by available gravity and seismic refraction data and reveals the cumulative effects of the multiple tectonomagmatic episodes that affected the area in the past on current crustal and upper mantle structure. The results show that the resistive lithospheric root of the São Francisco cratonic plate is restricted to the easternmost part of the profile and does not extend westward beneath the Brasília belt. The external zone of the fold belt, composed of slightly metamorphosed rocks at the surface, presents crustal conductors that can be tentatively interpreted as regions with fossil fluid flows at mid-crust depth beneath a gold mineralization zone and as a very shallow mineralized zone within the meta-morphic rocks. The external zone is separated to the west from the Goiás massif by a strong conductivity con-trast, indicative of a suture zone along the Rio Maranhão fault system. Crustal conductivity structure under the Niquelândia complex is distinct from what is observed in other parts of the Goiás massif, in agreement with the proposal of the complex being an allochthonous block. In spite of the large tectonothermal events that affected the Goiás magmatic arc there are no significant conductive anomalies at crustal depths in its eastern side. The most prominent feature detected in the geoelectric model is a huge high conductivity anomaly below the entire Goiás massif in the central part of the belt, mainly concentrated at the uppermost mantle but also affecting mid to lower crustal depths. It can be interpreted as associated with thermal events either related to Mesoproterozoic and/or Neoproterozoic continental rifting processes or to delamination and detachment pro-cesses at the end of the evolution of the belt, in the Neoproterozoic. Effects related to oceanic lithosphere subduc-tion during the collision and accretion of the Goiás massif and Goiás magmatic arc to the western passive margin of the São Francisco cratonic plate in the Neoproterozoic may alternatively explain the anomaly.