Africa‐North America‐Eurasia plate circuit rotations, combined with Red Sea rotations and new estimates of crustal shortening in Iran define the Cenozoic history of the Neotethyan ocean between Arabia and Eurasia. The new constraints indicate that Arabia‐Eurasia convergence has been fairly constant at 2 to 3 cm/yr since 56 Ma with slowing of Africa‐Eurasia motion to <1 cm/yr near 25 Ma, coeval with the opening of the Red Sea. Ocean closure occurred no later than 10 Ma, and could have occurred prior to this time only if a large amount of continental lithosphere was subducted, suggesting that slowing of Africa significantly predated the Arabia‐Eurasia collision. These kinematics imply that Africa's disconnection with the negative buoyancy of the downgoing slab of lithosphere beneath southern Eurasia slowed its motion. The slow, steady rate of northward subduction since 56 Ma contrasts with strongly variable rates of magma production in the Urumieh‐Dokhtar arc, implying magma production rate in continental arcs is not linked to subduction rate.

[1] Arc volcanism across Iran is dominated by a Paleogene pulse, despite protracted and presumably continuous subduction along the northern margin of the Neotethyan ocean for most of Mesozoic and Cenozoic time. New U-Pb and 40 Ar/ 39 Ar data from volcanic arcs in central and northern Iran constrain the duration of the pulse to ∼17 Myr, roughly 10% of the total duration of arc magmatism. Late Paleocene-Eocene volcanic rocks erupted during this flare-up have major and trace element characteristics that are typical of continental arc magmatism, whereas the chemical composition of limited Oligocene basalts in the Urumieh-Dokhtar belt and the Alborz Mountains which were erupted after the flare-up ended are more consistent with derivation from the asthenosphere. Together with the recent recognition of Eocene metamorphic core complexes in central and east central Iran, stratigraphic evidence of Eocene subsidence, and descriptions of Paleogene normal faulting, these geochemical and geochronological data suggest that the late Paleocene-Eocene magmatic flare-up was extension related. We propose a tectonic model that attributes the flare-up to decompression melting of lithospheric mantle hydrated by slab-derived fluids, followed by Oligocene upwelling and melting of enriched mantle that was less extensively modified by hydrous fluids. We suggest that Paleogene magmatism and extension was driven by an episode of slab retreat or slab rollback following a Cretaceous period of flat slab subduction, analogous to the Laramide and post-Laramide evolution of the western United States.

An ~100-km-long north-south belt of metamorphic core complexes is localized along the boundary between the Yazd and Tabas tectonic blocks of the central Iranian microcontinent, between the towns of Saghand and Posht-e-Badam. Amphibolite facies mylonitic gneisses are structurally overlain by easttilted supracrustal rocks including thick (>1 km), steeply dipping, nonmarine siliciclastic and volcanic strata. Near the detachment (the Neybaz-Chatak fault), the gneisses are generally overprinted by chlorite brecciation. Crosscutting relationships along with U-Pb zircon and 40 Ar/ 39 Ar age data indicate that migmatization, mylonitic deformation, volcanism, and sedimentation all occurred in the middle Eocene, between ca. 49 and 41 Ma. The westernmost portion of the Tabas block immediately east of the complexes is an east-tilted crustal section of Neoproterozoic-Cambrian crystalline rocks and metasedimentary strata >10 km thick. The 40 Ar/ 39 Ar biotite ages of 150-160 Ma from structurally deep parts of the section contrast with ages of 218-295 Ma from shallower parts, and suggest Late Jurassic tilting of the crustal section. These results defi ne three events: (1) a Late Jurassic period of upper crustal cooling of the western Tabas block that corresponds to regional Jurassic-Cretaceous tectonism and erosion recorded by a strong angular unconformity below mid-Cretaceous strata throughout central Iran; (2) profound, approximately east-west middle Eocene crustal extension, plutonism, and volcanism (ca. 44-40 Ma); and (3) ~2-3 km of early Miocene (ca. 20 Ma) erosional exhumation of both core complex and Tabas block assemblages at uppermost crustal levels, resulting from signifi cant north-south shortening. The discovery of these and other complexes within the mid-Tertiary magmatic arcs of Iran demonstrates that Cordilleran-style core complexes are an important tectonic element in all major segments of the Alpine-Himalayan orogenic system.

Current understanding of secular changes in the carbon isotopic composition of midto late Ediacaran carbonates suggests a relatively long, steady recovery of the global ocean from the Shuram negative excursion, followed by a smaller negative excursion at the Precambrian-Cambrian boundary. New radiometric, stratigraphic, and carbon isotope data from thick exposures of the upper Johnnie Formation in the Panamint Range of eastern California, combined with data from carbonate-rich facies of the Stirling Quartzite in the Funeral Mountains, confi rm an Ediacaran age for these strata and provide a more complete record of isotopic variations during this time interval than previously determined from SW Laurentia and other key sections around the globe. A siltstone in the lower part of the Johnnie Formation yielded a detrital zircon grain with an age of 640.33 ± 0.09 Ma, lowering the maximum radiometric age constraint on the Johnnie Formation by >400 m.y., consistent with an Ediacaran age based on chemo-and biostratigraphic data. In contrast to previous C isotope compilations from this region, which were generally based on relatively thin portions of the Cordilleran miogeocline near its depositional hinge, the more basinward exposures exhibit a recovery from values near -12‰ to 0‰ within the upper part of the Johnnie Formation. Details in the shape of the chemostratigraphic profi le through the upper Johnnie Formation closely match those in profi les through the Wonoka Formation in South Australia (which lies above the basal Ediacaran global stratotype section and point) and the Shuram-Buah interval in Oman, confi rming temporal correlation and suggesting genesis through changes in the isotopic composition of the global ocean. The Shuram excursion in SW Laurentia is followed by at least three smaller Ediacaran to earliest Cambrian isotopic excursions recorded within, from oldest to youngest, the uppermost Johnnie Formation, the middle Stirling Quartzite, and the lower Wood Canyon Formation. These data indicate that the negative excursion associated with the base of the Cambrian is not a unique postShuram event, and that post-Shuram, preCambrian animal evolution occurred in an environment of repeated large-magnitude fl uctuations in the carbon isotopic composition of the global ocean.