Provenance evolution and drainage reorganization during tectonic inversion of a continental rift basin: Detrital zircon evidence from the Late Cretaceous Songliao Basin, NE China

Abstract

Since the Mesozoic, Northeast Asia has been profoundly influenced by the complex interactions of multiple tectonic systems. In the Late Cretaceous, subduction of the Pacific Plate beneath the Eurasian continent has caused compression of previous extensional system, called tectonic inversion, and triggered shrinkage of continental basins, such as the Songliao Basin. However, the relationship between the source-sink system and drainage pattern evolution in the Songliao Basin during the tectonic inversion period remains to be further studied, particularly in the late stage of the tectonic inversion, where the source-sink system lacks constraints from detrital zircon data. Based on the core obtained through the International Continental Scientific Drilling Project of the Songliao Basin, this study conducted U–Pb dating of the detrital zircons in the latest Cretaceous (∼70 Ma) Mingshui Formation. The zircon U–Pb data indicate that the most significant age peaks are 100 Ma, 170 Ma, and 267 Ma, while the relatively significant intervals include 220–230 Ma and 1799–1999 Ma. By comparing with the provenance areas, it is found that the provenance of the latest Cretaceous Songliao Basin, which belongs to the tectonic inversion stage, is distinctly different from that of the early Late Cretaceous post-rift stage. This significant change in the provenance system is attributed to the increased subduction rate of the Pacific plate and the shift in subduction direction since ∼84 Ma, which led to uplift and erosion in the southeastern part of the basin and consequently impacted the source-sink system of the basin.