A Textural Record of Solidification and Cooling in the Skaergaard Intrusion, East Greenland

• Published in: Journal of Petrology
• Main Authors: Holness, Marian B., Tegner, Christian, Nielsen, Troels F. D., Stripp, Gemma, Morse, Stearns A.
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: Oxford University Press 2007
• Subjects: Original Papers; Greenland; East Greenland
• Online Access: http://petrology.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/short/48/12/2359; https://doi.org/10.1093/petrology/egm064

The clinopyroxene–plagioclase–plagioclase dihedral angle, Θ cpp , in gabbroic cumulates records the time-integrated thermal history in the sub-solidus and provides a measure of textural maturity. Variations in Θ cpp through the Layered Series of the Skaergaard intrusion, East Greenland, demonstrate that the onset of crystallization of clinopyroxene (within LZa), Fe–Ti oxides (at the base of LZc) and apatite (at the base of UZb) as liquidus phases in the bulk magma is recorded by a stepwise increase in textural maturity, related to an increase in the contribution of latent heat to the total heat loss to the surroundings and a reduction in the specific cooling rate at the crystallization front of the intrusion. The onset of both liquidus Fe–Ti oxide and apatite crystallization is marked by a transient increase in textural maturity, probably linked to overstepping before nucleation. Textural maturation at pyroxene–plagioclase–plagioclase triple junctions effectively ceases in the uppermost parts of the Layered Series as a result of the entire pluton cooling below the closure temperature for dihedral angle change, which is ≤1075°C. Solidification of the Layered Series of the Skaergaard intrusion occurred via the upwards propagation of a mush zone only a few metres thick.