Themes

The symposium will focus on the following four themes:

1. Granites and the generation and evolution of the continental crust

(Conveners: Jean-François Moyen, Xian-Hua Li, Williams Collins, Gary Stevens)

This theme focuses on the nature of the granitic record, and the generation and evolution of the continental crust. What processes generated the magmas which created the Paleoarchean granitoid crust? What is the relationship between plutonic magmatism in the early Archean and the stabilization of Archean cratons? What can granitic rocks tell us about the episodic or continuous growth of continental crust? What is the relationship between granites and supercontinent cycles? Can we identify processes and parameters common to granites that define particular settings or periods of Earth’s history? Studies on the links between granite composition, tectonism, and continental evolution are welcome in this theme.

2. Processes that control the generation of granitic magmas in the deep crust

(Conveners: Federico Farina, Jin-Hui Yang, Fernando Bea, Chang-Qian Ma)

This theme covers the large volume of observations from experimental studies, field studies, whole-rock and mineral geochemical studies, and thermodynamic modeling that focus on the generation of granitic magmas. How to create and how to constrain the conditions, particularly temperature and fluid state, necessary to generate large volumes of granitic magma? What range of different mechanisms constitutes viable heat sources to drive granitic magmatism? What are the detailed processes that control crustal anatexis? What is the nature of the source rocks for granitic melts? What characteristics can be used to differentiate between granitic melts derived from crustal sources from those derived by differentiation of mantle-derived magmas? Can the physical properties of granite magmas be reconciled with the structural records in granitic plutons? Studies on granites and their accessory minerals, migmatites, nanogranites, experimental studies, and thermodynamic and geochemical modeling are critical to addressing these issues. 

3. Mineralization associated with granitic magmatism

(Conveners: Mei-Fu Zhou, Bernd Lehmann, Rui-Zhong Hu)

This theme focuses on the different types of mineralization associated with granitic magmatism. What are the sources of the ore-forming elements? How do they migrate and accumulate during magma evolution and within magmatic fluids? Studies on the mineralogy, geochronology, and geochemistry of granitic pegmatites provide key pieces of information to address these questions. The composition and physical conditions of fluid inclusions are also important. Experimental studies, theoretical modeling, and the application of new analytical techniques (e.g., stable metal isotopes) to characterize the behavior of elements within fluids are also welcome.

4. Magmatic processes of large granitoid plutons and felsic volcanic complexes

(Conveners: Xiao-Lei Wang, Calvin Miller, Yaoling Niu, Catherine Annen)

This theme deals with all of the magmatic processes (e.g., fractional crystallization/crystal accumulation, crustal assimilation, magma mixing, and magma dynamics, etc.) involved in shaping the final composition of granitic and felsic volcanic rocks. Over what time frame are granite plutons and batholiths constructed? Are granitoid plutons formed by many small pulses or one massive magma batch? What can accessory minerals tell us about the construction (including the size of magma batches and the residue time of these batches, etc.) of plutons? How to understand the texture, mineralogy and heterogeneities of granitic rocks? Are felsic volcanic rocks the extrusive counterparts of granitic plutons? This theme would cover the many different interpretations that can be applied to granitic rocks that at some levels are seemingly quite similar, in terms of mineralogy, geochemistry etc.

Any comments and suggestions on the themes are welcome. Please contact with Prof. Xi-Sheng Xu (xsxu@nju.edu.cn) or Prof. Xiao-Lei Wang (wxl@nju.edu.cn ).