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African Archaean mobile belts and granite–greenstone terrain

Abstract

ARCHAEAN granite–greenstone terrains such as the west African and Rhodesian Cratons, are frequently bordered by pene-contemporaneous, long-lived, high-grade mobile belts containing granulite facies supracrustals, enderbites, granite gneisses and anorthosites. For example, in Sierra Leone1, the granite–greenstone terrain contains low-grade supracrustal belts along NNE–SSW trends, while the discordant Kasila Group granulite facies belt trends NW–SE, and forms the coastal border of the West African Craton. A similar relationship is found between the Rhodesian and Kaapvaal Cratons, which are separated by the east–west trending Limpopo Belt2,3. The metamorphic, structural and lithological contrasts between mobile belts and granite–greenstone terrain have been ascribed to contrasts in heat-flow regime. I attempt here to correlate field and experimental data to elucidate Archaean mobile belt–craton relationships.

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WILLIAMS, H. African Archaean mobile belts and granite–greenstone terrain. Nature 266, 163–164 (1977). https://doi.org/10.1038/266163a0

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