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Great Glen Fault and Timing of Granite Intrusion on the Proto-Atlantic Continental Margins

Abstract

Age distribution patterns for the British Caledonian granites—the products of destructive plate margin processes—are most consistent with a reconstruction based on dextral transcurrent faulting in the Great Glen. Post-intrusive cooling rates (3 to 10° C per m.y.) suggest an Ordovician metamorphic climax which predates closure of the Proto–Atlantic ocean. Consequently there arose many geological contrasts between the opposing continental margins.

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BROWN, G., HUGHES, D. Great Glen Fault and Timing of Granite Intrusion on the Proto-Atlantic Continental Margins. Nature Physical Science 244, 129–132 (1973). https://doi.org/10.1038/physci244129a0

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