Cambrian to Devonian Geologic Evolution of the Sierra de Comechingones, Eastern Sierras Pampeanas, Argentina: Evidence for the Development and Exhumation of Continental Crust on the Proto-Pacific Margin of Gondwana

Crystalline rocks from the Sierra de Comechingones, eastern Sierras Pampeanas, evolved through three distinct orogenic cycles during the Eopalaeozoic: (1) the first tectono-thermal event named Pampean orogeny (550 to 505 Ma), which peaked in the Early Cambrian, was responsible for extensive metamorphism, partial melting, juvenile magmatism, rapid decompression, and persistent tectonic activity. Large part of the crustal section that was residing at middle levels (c. 27 km) was heated above 800 °C during the thermal peak stage of the Pampean orogeny; decompression of the Pampean orogen's core took place at this high temperature. The exhumation mechanism that assisted rapid uplifting combined the effects of ongoing tectonic forces with a buoyant instability created by a large amount of anatectic magmas in the middle to lower crust. (2) Beginning at the Early Ordovician, the Famatinian orogeny produced an overall shortening, causing pervasive textural reworking of the Cambrian metamorphic sequences under a high-strain regime. By being adjacent to the Famatinian magmatic arc, the western border of the Cambrian crystalline package absorbed imposed deformation along a crustal scale ductile shear zone. Within this zone, the high-grade metamorphic rocks were reworked and re-hydrated to lower temperature assemblages (<600°C and 3–6 kbar). Early Ordovician subduction-related igneous activity, even though manifested as small plutons, intruded Cambrian crystalline sequences, and experienced textural reworking during Late Famatinian tectonic exhumation. Late Famatinian convergence resulted in west-vergent ductile shear zones that placed Cambrian onto Ordovician crystalline sequences. (3) During post-Famatinian times (360–400 Ma) enduring crustal perturbation produced intra-crustal-derived granitic magmatism. West- to northwest-directed thrusting was concentrated in belts nucleated along crustal-scale tectonic boundaries formed between older tectono-stratigraphic units. As a result, Devonian anatectic granites were formed and tectonically extruded among Pampean and Famatinian crystalline sequences. The post-Famatinian event is also characterised by the intrusion of batholith-scale monzogranites into Pampean and Famatinian crystalline sequences residing in the upper crust.

Crystalline rocks currently exposed in the Sierra de Comechingones show that they crystallised and were exhumed in a setting where tectono-thermal activity lasted, even though it might have waned, until the Middle Palaeozoic. From the latest Neoproterozoic (c. 550 Ma) until the Late Devonian (c. 360 Ma) tectonic activity was intermittently acting, indicating continuous convergence along the proto-Pacific margin of Gondwana.