Age and tectonic setting of the Bavanat Cu-Zn-Ag Besshi-type volcanogenic massive sulfide deposit, southern Iran

The Bavanat Cu-Zn-Ag Besshi-type volcanogenic massive sulfide (VMS) deposit occurs within the Surian volcano-sedimentary complex in the Sanandaj-Sirjan zone (SSZ) of southern Iran. The Surian complex is comprised of pelite, sandstone, calcareous shale, basalt, gabbro sills, and thin-bedded limestone. Mineralization occurs as stratiform sheet-like and tabular orebodies hosted mainly by greenschist metamorphosed feldspathic and quartz feldspathic sandstone, basalt, and pelites. The basalts of the Surian complex show predominantly tholeiitic to transitional affinities, with a few samples that are alkalic in composition. Primitive mantle-normalized trace and rare earth element (REE) patterns of the Surian basalts display depletions in light REE, negative anomalies of Nb, Ta, and Ti, and positive anomalies of P. Positive P anomalies are indicative of minor crustal contamination. Furthermore, Th enrichments in the mid-ocean ridge basalt-normalized patterns of the Surian basalts are characteristic of rifted arc basalts emplaced in continental margin subduction zones. The high MgO content (>6 wt.%) of most Surian basalts and low TiO₂ content of two samples (0.53 and 0.62 wt.%) are characteristic of boninites. The aforementioned features of the basalts indicate arc tholeiites emplaced in intra-arc rift environments and continental margin subduction zones. U-Pb dating by laser ablation- inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry of detrital zircons extracted from the host feldspathic and quartz feldspathic sandstone yields various ages that are predominantly Permian and Triassic; however, the youngest zircons give a mean Early Jurassic concordant U-Pb age of 191 ± 12 Ma. This age, together with geological and petrochemical data, indicate that VMS mineralization formed in the Early Jurassic in pull-apart basins within the SSZ. These basins and the VMS mineralization may be temporally related to an intra-arc volcano-plutonic event associated with Neo-Tethyan oblique subduction.