Restored transect across the exhumed Grenville orogen of Laurentia and Amazonia, with implications for crustal architecture

New (40)Ar/(39)Ar analyses from a transect across the major tectonic units of the southwest Amazon craton document the heterogeneous effects of the late Mesoproterozoic collision with the Grenville margin of North America. Basement rocks of the Amazon and adjacent Paragua cratons mostly preserve pre-Grenvillian ages (older than 1.3 Ga). Localized isotopic age resetting at 1.18-1.12 Ga is caused by Grenvillian activation of widespread, sinistral strike-slip shear zones in the Amazon basement. In the Nova Brasillandia belt between these two cratons, new (40)Ar/39Ar data record cooling through 920 Ma after the granulite facies deformation of this suture zone. Regional cooling rates calculated from compiled U/Pb, (40)Ar/(39)Ar, and Rb/Sr thermochronologic data are used to establish post-Grenvillian exhumation patterns for the southwest Amazon and the North American belt. Paleodepths calculated for 1.0 Ga along a transect of the restored 1300-km-wide belt vary from uniformly deep levels (15-30 km) exposed in North America to shallower levels (515 km) observed in the southwest Amazon. We interpret this difference as reflective of a change in tectonic architecture, i.e., thrust-dominated deformation in Laurentia versus strike-slip dominated deformation in the Amazon, with a commensurate variation in crustal thickness. This interpretation explains the widespread preservation of both pre-Grenvillian ages and collisional ages from the Amazon craton, in contrast with the more homogeneous array of cooling ages from the North American Grenville Province marking the postorogenic extensional collapse of an overthickened crust. The asymmetrical orogenic architecture from the reconstructed Grenville belt mirrors cross sections proposed for modern orogenic belts where deep-crustal rocks are not yet exposed.