Late Stages in the Evolution of the Late Mesozoic East Mongolian Volcanic Areal: Rock Age and Composition

Abstract

The Mandakh–Mandal–Gobi (MMG) zone of alkali basalt magmatism has been delineated in the Late Mesozoic East Mongolian volcanic areal. It comprises clusters of igneous rock bodies and isolated stocks, domes, sills, laccoliths, dikes, and limited fragments of lava flows composed of tephrite, phono–tephrite, and trachybasalt. Two pulses of magmatism in the MMG zone have occurred in the Late Cretaceous (about 85 Ma) and Early Cenozoic (about 50 Ma). Recognition of this zone and deciphering of its formation history demonstrated that the development of the entire East Mongolian volcanic areal had the same regularities as those identified in other major regions of the Late Mesozoic Central Asia magmatic province. This indicates that the areal undoubtedly belongs to the latter. These facts support the conclusion that the correlation observed through the zone’s evolution between reduction in the volume of igneous products and the change in their composition towards the OIB was apparently determined by a decrease in the effect of thermal sublithospheric mantle melts upon a metasomatically enriched lithospheric mantle, leading to its gradual elimination from the magma sources.