Search

Based on the spatial distribution of ancient rocks and zircons, three ancient terranee older than ca. 2.6 Ga have recently been identified in the North China Craton, namely the Eastern, Southern, and Central Ancient Terranee. The Eastern Ancient Terrane is the best studied and understood of the three ancient terranes. It has a long geological history back to ca. 3.8 Ga ago and includes the areas of Anshan-Benxi, eastern Hebei, eastern Shandong and western Shandong. In Anshan-Benxi, several different types of 3.8 Ga rocks were discovered together with 3.1–3.7 Ga rocks, whereas 2.9–3.0 Ga K-rich granites and 2.5 Ga syenogranite occur on larger scales. In eastern Hebei, 3.0–3.4 Ga rocks and older detrital and xenocrystic zircons were identified. In eastern Shandong, there are a large volumes of 2.7 Ga and 2.9 Ga rocks. In western Shandong, early Neoarchean (2.6–2.7 Ga) intrusive and supracrustal rocks are widely distributed. Whole-rock Nd and zircon Hf isotope data suggest that both mantle additions and crustal recycling played important roles within the Eastern Ancient Terrane during almost every tectono-magmatic event. Most BIFs in the North China Craton are late Neoarchean in age and are distributed on continental crust along the western margin of the Eastern Ancient Terrane, probably suggesting that a stable environment was one of the key factors for the formation of large-scale BIFs.

Clastic sedimentary rocks are natural samples of the exposed continental crust over large areas. The Hanjiang River drains the northern Yangtze craton, including the South Qinling belt and the northern parts of the Yangtze craton. Detrital zircons from this river thus provide an ideal sample for studying the formation and evolution of the northern Yangtze craton. Here we report laser ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometer U-Pb ages of 122 detrital zircons from one sand sample of the Hanjiang River. The 110 concordant zircons reveal four major age groups of 768, 444, 212, and 124 Ma, which well correlate with known magmatic events in the northern Yangtze craton. A minor group is present at 1 536 Ma, which is less known in the study area. Only seven zircons have ages of >1 750 Ma. Our results show that the Early Paleozoic, Late Triassic, and Early Cretaceous are important episodes of zircon growth and crustal growth/reworking in addition to the previously documented Neoproterozoic event. Our results suggest very limited exposures of Paleoproterozoic and Archean rocks in the northern parts of the Yangtze craton.