Paleozoic Plate Tectonic Evolution of the Western Gondwana Margin in Northern Chile and Northwestern Argentina

摘要

In Gondwanaland, in the area of the present north-western Argentina and northern Chile, a west-facing active margin developed in the Late Cambrian and Ordovician after the Early Cambrian Pampean Orogeny. Stratigraphic and geochronological data on sedimentary, volcanic and plutonic units of the southern Central Andes of northern Chile and NW Argentina define a lull in magmatic and metamorphic activity lasting for about 100 Ma from the early Silurian to the early Late Carboniferous. This corresponds to the evolution of a passive margin. The Late Carboniferous marks the renewed onset of subduction.