The quaternary volcanic rocks of the Geghama highland, Lesser Caucasus, Armenia: Geochronology, isotopic Sr-Nd characteristics, and origin

This paper reports on isotope-geochronologic, petrologic, and isotope-geochemical (Sr-Nd) studies of Quaternary magmatism in the Geghama neovolcanic area, Armenia, Lesser Caucasus. According to these studies, the period of youngest volcanic activity in the region lasted about 700 000 years, from 700 ka to a few tens of thousands of years ago. We found the time limits of five discrete phases of Quaternary volcanism: I (about 700 ka), II (550?480 ka), III (190?150 ka), IV (110?70 ka), and V (later than 50 ka). These phases seem to have lasted a few tens of thousands of years and were separated by quiescent periods of comparable durations. The petrologic and isotope-geochemical characteristics of Geghama effusive rocks show that they belong to the bimodal association rhyolite-trachyandesite and basaltic trachyandesite; this association was largely generated by fractional crystallization of primary basite melts, with the assimilation of crustal material by deep magmas being much less important. The isotopic parameters of the volcanic rocks studied here (0.70410–0.70437 for ⁸⁷Sr/⁸⁶Sr and +3.3 to +4.0 for ?_Nd) are practically identical for intermediate to basic and acid varieties in this association and are similar to those for young basites in the other areas of the Lesser Caucasus; this circumstance indicates a common origin for all Quaternary magmatic formations in the region. The petrogenesis of these varieties probably involved a single mantle source of the OIB type with certain regional peculiarities in the composition of the melts it generated. An analysis of the locations of Quaternary volcanoes in central Armenia (Geghama and Aragats areas) and in the Kars plateau, which is adjacent to it in the west, provided evidence of an eastward lateral migration of youngest magmatic activity in the region over time. The latest episodes of this migration took place in the eastern Geghama area, which must be the first to produce eruptions in the future.