Granulites and Palaeoproterozoic lower crust of the Baidarik Block, Central Asian Orogenic Belt of NW Mongolia

Abstract Mafic granulite xenoliths are hosted by garnetiferous charnockites in the Archaean to Palaeoproterozoic Bumbuger Complex of northwestern Mongolia, one of the exotic basement terranes in the Central Asian Orogenic Belt. These rocks crystallized at ca. 1850 Ma under granulite-facies conditions (800 ± 27 °C, 6.8 ± 0.6 kbar) in the lower crust and were partly retrogressed to amphibolite-facies during ascent to higher crustal levels as a result of strong deformation resulting in northwest-trending isoclinal folds. The mafic xenoliths are likely derived from gabbroic protoliths, and geochemical, Hf-in-zircon and Nd whole-rock isotopic data suggest these rocks to have originated from pare…