Basaltic rocks of the Jaeger Lake assemblage of Axel Heiberg Island and the Yelverton Formation of Ellesmere Island are Neoproterozoic to Cambrian in age and outcrop in a stratigraphic package dominated by carbonate. A lack of modern geochemical data on these
basalts has limited the ability to correlate the two assemblages and to comment on the tectonic setting from which they were generated.
Major, Trace, and Rare Earth Element (REE) geochemistry was performed on three samples collected by the Geological Survey of Canada (GSC) during the 2015-2017 field seasons. Trace element analysis indicates that volcanic flows of the Jaeger Lake assemblage and sills within the Yelverton Formation
are sub-alkaline basalts that form a geochemical array along a garnet-lherzolite petrogenetic trend. One sample from each assemblage has an REE pattern indicative of a magma derived from a garnet-bearing, EMORB source, while one Jaeger Lake sample has a strongly depleted, NMORB-like REE pattern.
We hypothesize that all 3 samples are from the same EMORB source and that the strongly depleted sample is the result of extreme, iterative partial melting. Trace elements alone cannot determine if this hypothesis is correct, so an ongoing Sr-Nd and U-Pb study is being undertaken to comment on the
age and source characteristics of these understudied basalts.
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