Eclogite at the Antarctic palaeo-Pacific active margin of Gondwana (Lanterman Range, northern Victoria Land, Antarctica)

• Published in: Antarctic Science
• Main Authors: RICCI, C. A., TALARICO, F., PALMERI, R., DI VINCENZO, G., PERTUSATI, P. C.
• Other Authors: Ricci, C. A., Talarico, F., Palmeri, R., Pertusati, P. C.
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: 1996
• Subjects: Antarctica; early Palaeozoic; subduction-accretion margin; Antarctic; Bowers; Lanterman Range; Pacific; The Antarctic; Victoria Land; Antarc*
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/11365/3510; https://doi.org/10.1017/S0954102096000399

Well-preserved eclogites were found for the first time in Antarctica, at the Lanterman Range, northern Victoria Land. They are part of a mafic- ultramafic belt that lies between the Wilson Terrane, representing part of the palaeo-Pacific margin of Gondwana, and the Bowers Terrane, a Cambro- Ordovician volcanic arc and related sediments, accreted to the margin during the Ross Orogeny. The eclogites formed at temperatures in the range 750- 850°C and pressures above 15 kbar and subsequently experienced a decompressional path to low pressure amphibolite facies conditions. The formation and exhumation of eclogites and the attainment of the metamorphic peak in adjacent rock units is consistent with a plate convergent setting model at the palaeo-Pacific margin of Gondwana.