The Neogene igneous bodies of the Cerro de las Minas (35.3°S-69.9°W), Main Cordillera of the Andes, SW of Mendoza: geology, petrography and geochemistry

Abstract

The cerro de las Minas (35.3°S-69.9°W) consists of four epizonal igneous units: diorite-tonalite, granodiorite and granite plutons and andesite dikes and sills. These units are part of the Neogene magmatic arc of SW Mendoza (Andesita Huincán). They intrude the sedimentary Jurassic Puchenque and Auquilco Formations. Near the contacts with plutons, the sedimentary rocks are modified to biotite and pyroxene hornfels, recrystallized limestones and superimposed banded Fe-skarns. Geochemically, they are cogenetic plutons with a wide compositional range. They are metaluminous, subalkaline with a calc-alkaline affinity, I- type plutons, like other plutons from convergent margins associated with Fe skarns. They evolved through a fractional crystallization process involving their main mineral components, (plagioclase-piroxene-anphibol-magnetite-titanite), and mingling between the diorite and granodiorite magmas. Their incompatible trace elements and REE patterns are similar to igenous rocks a) from the Neogene volcano-plutonic arc (Andesita Huincán), b) associated with Fe skarns of SW Mendoza (Hierro Indio and El Kaiser), c) of the cerro Nevazón, from the Paleogene volcano-plutonic Arc of NW Neuquén, and c) of the Andean Quaternary volcanic segment of the TSVZ (34.5°-37° SL), wich are emplaced on a relatively thin continental crust (35-50 km). This suggests that the parental magma of the cerro de las Minas plutons came from calc-alkaline and metaluminous magmas derived from primary magmas generated in a similar mantle source, with little or no residual garnet.