Protracted construction of gabbroic crust at a slow-spreading ridge: Constraints from SHRIMP Pb/U zircon ages in IODP hole 1309D, Atlantis Massif, MAR (30°N)

We present U-Pb zircon ages for 18 samples from lower oceanic crust recovered by IODP Hole 1309D in the footwall to an oceanic detachment fault. These samples are evolved oxide gabbros and felsic dikes from between 40-1415 meters below sea floor (mbsf). Ages range from 1.08±0.07 Ma to 1.28±0.05 Ma with errors as low as 1.6%, and reveal a protracted history of accretion. U-Pb zircon dating was performed using the U.S.G.S.-Stanford SHRIMP-RG. Seven ages from both oxide gabbros and felsic dikes above 570 mbsf give a weighted mean of 1.17±0.02 Ma (MSWD=1.03). Oxide gabbros between 620-1040 mbsf are consistently older and give a weighted mean age of 1.24±0.03 (MSWD=1.4). Two felsic dikes within this interval (867 and 1040 mbsf) give younger ages of 1.14±0.05 Ma. In the deepest section (below ~1040 mbsf) oxide gabbros give varied ages of 1.27±0.05 Ma (1175 mbsf) and 1.14±0.04 (1240 and 1327 mbsf). The deepest sample is a felsic dike intruding gabbro at 1415 mbsf, and has an age of 1.28±0.05 Ma. Abrupt changes in the age of the oxide gabbros (at ~600 and below 1040 mbsf) coincide with petrologic and geochemical variations, and indicate the presence of distinct intrusive bodies, which we interpret as sills. The overall weighted mean age of the crust penetrated by 1309D is 1.20±0.02 Ma (MSWD=7.1). However, the range of zircon crystallization ages indicates that this section of crust was constructed over at least ~100-200kyr. This is a minimum estimate because dated samples intrude more primitive olivine-rich rocks and are cut by later diabase. Shallow paleomagnetic remanence inclinations of -38° to -31.5° from below 180 mbsf in Hole 1309D, along with generally steep magmatic fabrics (~40-60°), imply up to 55° of counter- clockwise rotation associated with detachment faulting. The mean age of the hole, together with additional Pb/U zircon ages determined from dive and dredge samples from the southern wall of Atlantis Massif constrain the slip rate of the detachment fault to be between 12 and 15.8 mm/yr. The higher rate implies asymmetric spreading and is consistent with the gabbros being emplaced at depths of 5-7 km below the ridge axis and transported to the seafloor along a curved detachment fault. A significant result is the observation of increasingly older ages with depth in the hole. This result is not consistent with a model whereby melt intrudes at a constant depth beneath the detachment fault, because such a model predicts younging downwards. The data are however consistent with a multiple sill model whereby sills intrude at random depths.