Combined Short-lived (182W, 142Nd) and Long-lived (147Sm-143Nd) Isotope Study on Rocks from the Pulpwood-Playter Harbour Sequence (Wawa Subprovince): Constraints on the Mantle Source of Neoarchean Ferropicrites

• Main Author: Landon-Browne, Ayesha
• Other Authors: O'Neil, Jonathan
• Format: Others
• Language: en
• Published: Université d'Ottawa / University of Ottawa 2019
• Subjects: Geochemistry; Geochronology; Isotopes
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10393/39573; http://dx.doi.org/10.20381/ruor-23816

Short-lived isotope systems can be utilized to track differentiation processes that had occurred during Earth’s early history. Both the 182Hf-182W and 146Sm-142Nd systems are sensitive to silicate fractionation events due to differing parent-daughter incompatibilities. The 182Hf-182W system is also affected by metal-silicate fractionation events due to the siderophile nature of W. An increasing number of mantle-derived rocks, mainly formed during the Archean (4.0-2.5 Ga), have presented variable anomalies in the daughter products of both systems, indicating their sources contain isotope signatures established shortly after the formation of the Earth. Some Archean Fe-rich primitive magmas known as ferropicrites, have been suggested to derive from mantle domains that differentiated after the crystallization of a Hadean (>4.0 Ga) magma ocean. In order to investigate the potential involvement of a Hadean source in the petrogenesis of Archean ferropicrites, we have studied the Nd and W isotopic compositions of rocks from the Pulpwood-Playter Harbour sequence in the Wawa subprovince, Ontario, Canada. This sequence is composed of ferropicritic intrusive rocks and lavas in association with tholeiitic mafic lavas. A 147Sm-143Nd isochron including all lithologies yields an age of 2681±51 Ma (MSWD =6.6) with an initial 143Nd of +2.5. This Nd initial isotopic composition indicates the rocks were derived from a long-term incompatible-element depleted mantle source. Both the ferropicritic and the tholeiitic rocks plot on the same isochron, suggesting they derived from the same mantle source, despite their different geochemical compositions. Negative 142Nd anomalies compared to the Nd terrestrial standard were found in the majority of the rocks studied here, yielding an average μ142Nd value of -2.0±3.9. Although not resolvable from the terrestrial standard given iii the current analytical precision, the fact that almost all analysed samples exhibit negative μ142Nd values could suggest the influence of a Hadean source in their formation. If this is the case, a single early silicate fractionation event occurring between 4.56 and 4.47 Ga could explain both the ε143Nd and μ142Nd values obtained for the studied rocks. Alternatively, the involvement of eclogitic material, with a Hadean basaltic protolith, interacting with Archean peridotitic mantle could explain the Nd isotopic composition of the ferropicrites, but this would not account for the identical isotopic composition of the tholeiites – thus rendering a garnet pyroxenite source improbable. One intrusive ferropicritic sample yielded a resolvable 182W excess of +14.1 ±6.7 ppm. If this excess 182W is characteristic of the Pulpwood-Playter Harbour sequence, it indicates the decoupling of 182Hf-182W and 146Sm-142Nd systems. This decoupling could be explained by early metal-silicate fractionation recorded in the Hf-W systematics of these rocks or the contribution of Fe-rich meteoritic material into the source of ferropicrites.