Geology of the Arroio Grande Metamafic-Ultramafic Association, Southeasterh Sul-Rio-Grandense Shield

Abstract

In Rio Grande do Sul State (southern Brazil) several occurrences of ultramafic rocks are recognized and described in the central and western portions of the Sul-rio-grandense Shield. However, no scientific work referred to this type of rock association for the eastern portion of the Shield. In this paper, a study of a metamafic-ultramafic rock association is shown, located at the southern end of the eastern portion of the Sul-Rio- -Grandense Shield, near the town of Arroio Grande. Through field investigation, petrography, scanning electron microscopy and X-ray diffraction hornblende-plagioclase-epidote rich amphibolites, chromian serpentinites and their metasomatic products (tremolitites, chloritites and talc schists) were identified. Amphibolite facies paragenesis were characterized for both epidote amphibolites and metasomatites. The Arroio Grande rock association was interpreted to represent fragments of an ancient ocean floor obducted during the closure of a paleo-ocean in Neoproterozoic times, possibly due to collision of the Kalahari and Río de La Plata paleoplates in the final stages of Western Gondwana assembly.