Seminar

The geology of northern and central India preserves a rich and prolonged history of ancient crustal formation and stabilization, sedimentation and erosion, large igneous province magmatism, and modern continent-continent collision. This study utilizes modern methods in low-temperature thermochronology, geochronology, geochemistry, and basin analysis to elucidate the complex geologic evolution of central to northern India. New thermochronometric data indicate that the Bundelkhand craton of central India experienced a broad-scale pulse of exhumation through mid-crustal depths at ~2.4–2.3 Ga following amalgamation—an event that may have contributed to lithospheric strengthening and craton stability. Basement zircon and apatite (U-Th)/He (ZHe and AHe, respectively) data reveal an extreme inversion in AHe and ZHe dates that current radiation damage accumulation and annealing models cannot adequately predict for a given thermal history. However, thermal models derived from detrital ZHe and AHe data suggest that the craton last experienced peak burial temperatures of ~150 °C between ~850–475 Ma, followed by a major phase of exhumation at ~350 Ma that may have been driven by either Late Paleozoic glacial scouring and/or dynamic topographic uplift. These models additionally indicate that ~66–65 Ma Deccan Traps volcanism thermally perturbed the Bundelkhand region ~200 km north of present-day basalt exposures. New provenance data from the Frontal Himalaya of northwest India agree with models for the onset of India–Asia collision by ~59 Ma, and Cenozoic Himalayan forebulge migration may have uplifted and eroded away Deccan basalts and Vindhyan strata overlying the Bundelkhand craton, producing its modern-day surface exposure.

Zoom: https://tinyurl.com/y26zyey6 
(Meeting ID: 988 5163 3495)

Please contact : Mr. Cody L. Colleps, colleps@hku.hk for zoom password