Cooling of a Late-Syn Orogenic Pluton: Evidence from Laser K-feldspar Modelling of the Carion Granite,Madagascar

Since the late 1980s, it has been hypothesized that the wide range of apparent argon ages seen within single K-feldspar samples might be due to a distribution of diffusion domain sizes within the mineral. To test and apply this idea, an analytical technique that combines conventional laboratory degassing experiments (resistance heating) with numerical inversion procedures has been developed to extract cooling history information from feldspars. A key part of the method involves careful control of temperature in the laboratory to constrain the diffusion parameters of the feldspar samples. In our study, we have K-feldspar data from single crystals that mimic the types of data seen in classic resistance heater fusion experiments. Our step-heating data are based on using a continuous argon-ion laser with no direct control on temperature. However, with only a single added free parameter in the model, we show that it is possible to analyze this data in the multi-domain style, and make some simple inferences on the nature of the cooling history of the Carion pluton in central Madagascar. The Carion granitic pluton in central Madagascar was intruded into warm continental crust following orogenic events related to the final amalgamation of Gondwana. U-Pb SHRIMP dating of the pluton yields an emplacement age of 532.1 ± 5.2 Ma followed by relatively slow cooling as constrained by ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar ages on hornblende, biotite and K-feldspar. Four hornblende samples yielded a mean ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar age of 512.7 ± 2.6 Ma. A biotite sample yielded an age of 478.9 ± 1.0 Ma and modeled K-feldspar ages show cooling from 350° C at 466 Ma to 100° C by 410 Ma. Collectively, the data suggest that the pluton cooled from 850° C at 532.1 ± 5.2 (U-Pb zircon) Ma to 500° C at 512.7 ± 2.6 Ma (⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar hornblende), or approximately 18 °C/Ma slowing to ～4 °C/Ma between 512 Ma and 478 Ma and finally to about 3°C/Ma between 478 and 410 Ma.