Mazatzal orogeny

The Mazatzal orogeny was an orogenic event in what is now the Southwestern United States from 1650 to 1600 Mya[1] in the Statherian Period of the Paleoproterozoic.

Preserved in the rocks of New Mexico and Arizona, it is interpreted as the collision of the 1700-1600 Mya age[1] Mazatzal island arc terrane with the proto-North American continent.

1200–1000 Mya Grenville orogeny during the final assembly of the supercontinent Rodinia, which ended an 800-million-year episode of convergent boundary tectonism.

[2][3][4][5][6] Age and isotope data show that southern North America is composed of a series of northeast-trending provinces representing island arc terranes accreted onto the 1800 Mya core of Laurentia.

This created short-lived extensional basins at 1700 and 1650 Mya that accumulated sand and high-silica volcanic debris to form Paleoproterozoic quartzite-rhyolite successions.

Individual island arc terranes accreted to Laurentia during the Yavapai Orogeny include the Pinal and lower Manzano Group.

[6] A number of quartzite-rhyolite successions previously associated with the Mazatal orogeny have been shown to contain both Paleoproterozoic and Mesoproterozoic formations, based on detrital zircon geochronology.

In contrast, Livingston's work in the Upper Salt River Canyon utilized Rb-Sr dating techniques to estimated the timing of the Mazatzal orogeny between 1425 and 1380 +/-100 Mya.

Detrital zircons from the Hopi Springs Shale in the northern Mazatzal Mountains yielded a maximum depositional age (MDA) of 1571 Mya.

[23] However, there are indications of three distinct orogenic episodes at the Black Canyon of the Gunnison, with an exhumation surface separating Yavapai and Mazatzal events.