Radiometric discrimination of pre-Variscan amphibolites in the Ediacaran Serie Negra (Ossa-Morena Zone, SW Iberia)

New results on the geochronology of metabasites hosted by the Neoproterozoic (late Ediacaran) Serie Negra of the Ossa-Morena Zone (Iberian Massif) are presented. These rocks record a protracted subduction at least since the latest Cryogenian, followed in a continuum by early Cambrian rifting. The Serie Negra country rocks are continental-crust forearc segments of the thinned continental margin of Gondwana. The metabasite suite exhibits E- and N-MORB, as well as volcanic arc signatures, and discloses the existence of a diverse Late Ediacaran-Early Cambrian magmatism across the Ossa-Morena Zone. Protoliths of the E-MORB metabasites are clearly Ediacaran. They exhibit geochemical characteristics typical of younger island arcs, notably of their forearc zones affected by extension soon after the initiation of subduction. Radiometric dating of N-MORE metabasites shows that these rocks are significatively younger than their country rocks, whose age has been stratigraphically and paleontologically constrained as Ediacaran. They record early Cambrian rifting developed in a continuum after a protracted subduction. Metabasite petrological zonation permits to reconstruct a single Ediacaran subduction zone located to the S of the current OMZ and dipping towards the N (in present day geographical coordinates). (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.