Emplacement processes and cooling history of layered cyclic unit II-7 from the Lovozero alkaline massif (Kola Peninsula, Russia)

The Lovozero alkaline massif (Kola Peninsula, Russia) is composed of three major units. The central unit (80% of the volume) comprises numerous well developed layers composed, from bottom to roof, of an urtite–juvite–foyaite–lujavrite continuous lithological sequence (ijolite–foid-bearing alkali feldspar syenite in IUGS nomenclature). The mode of emplacement of the massif and the mechanism of formation of the layering are still under debate. Petrological, mineralogical (two stages of crystallisation) and structural evidence from the detailed analysis of one of these layers (unit II-7) is interpreted in terms of both mechanical (magmatic to sub-solidus, non-coaxial deformation) and thermal differentiation operating on a crystal-laden (alkali feldspar, high T nepheline, aegirine-augite) material of foyaitic composition. Textural and mineralogical data suggest that a sheet of foiditic magma intruded into solidified earlier units of the Lovozero layered sequence and acquired a sill-like structure on cooling.