Evolution of tholeiitic diabase sheet systems in the eastern United States: examples from the Culpeper Basin, Virginia-Maryland, and the Gettysburg Basin, Pennsylvania

Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research
By: , and 

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Abstract

High-TiO2, quartz-normative (HTQ) tholeiite sheets of Early Jurassic age have intruded mainly Late Triassic sedimentary rocks in several early Mesozoic basins in the eastern US. Field observations, petrographic study, geochemical analyses and stable isotope data from three HTQ sheet systems were used to develop a general model of magmatic differentiation and magmatic-hydrothermal interaction for HTQ sheets. The three sheet systems have remarkably similar major-oxide and trace-element compositions. Cumulus and evolved diabase in comagmatic sheets separated by tens of kilometers are related by igneous differentiation. Differentiated diabase in all three sheets have petrographic and geochemical signatures and fluid inclusions indicating hydrothermal alteration beginning near magmatic temperatures and continuing to relatively low temperatures. Sulfur and oxygen isotope data are consistent with a magmatic origin for the hydrothermal fluid. -from Authors

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Publication type Article
Publication Subtype Journal Article
Title Evolution of tholeiitic diabase sheet systems in the eastern United States: examples from the Culpeper Basin, Virginia-Maryland, and the Gettysburg Basin, Pennsylvania
Series title Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research
DOI 10.1016/0377-0273(94)00085-U
Volume 64
Issue 3-4
Year Published 1995
Language English
Publisher Elsevier
Contributing office(s) Eastern Mineral and Environmental Resources Science Center
Description 17 p.
First page 143
Last page 169
Country United States
State Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia
Other Geospatial Culpeper Basin, Gettysburg Basin
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