Abstract
Geological and geochemical investigations including major, trace and rare-earth elements have been carried out on selected areas from the Arabian Shield. The results are compared with those from similar terrains elsewhere. This study includes accounts of age determinations, types of tectonism and zones of metamorphism.
The oldest rock in the eastern flank of the Arabian-Nubian Dome is the Khamis Mushayt fundamental gneiss in the southern region of the Arabian Shield which has a distinct REE pattern and a pre Pan-African age older than 1800 Ma. The age of the oldest continental rock in this sub-plate is older than 2500 Ma, comparable to similar ages in Egypt.
The major components in the Arabian Shield are plutonic rocks that range from felsic to basic in composition, with strongly alkaline or primitive tholeiitic series to mature calcic rocks occurring in a systematic trend. The rocks define at least five different subduction zones with a growth rate of about 20% of the modern global rate. These subduction zones are also indicated by the shallow crustal lithologies, by poly-metallic mineralization, and by oxygen-isotope and heat-flow data and by geophysical and geochemical behaviour. These rocks were formed in ensimatic island-arc and continental marginal-arc environments.
Most of the granitic rocks in the Arabian sub-plate have geochemical compositions and genetic relationships which suggest that they include both S-type and I-type granites. The youngest post-accretion granitic bodies have an age of about 450 Ma. and were formed by massive crustal fusion modified by fractional processes. The plutonic rocks are both mesozonal to epizonal. The crustal thickness of the Arabian sub-plate is estimated to be about 45 km.
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Sindi, H.O. (1992). Geochemical Evolution and Basement Tectonism of the Arabian-Nubian Dome. In: Rickard, M.J., Harrington, H.J., Williams, P.R. (eds) Basement Tectonics 9. Proceedings of the International Conferences on Basement Tectonics, vol 3. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-2654-0_9
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