The Parauapebas Formation constitutes a neoarquean extrusive unit and represents an important predominantly mafic, volcanic activity of the Serra Norte district in the Carajás Mineral Province, Pará. The basalts and basaltic-andesites of the Grão Pará Group (Carajás Domain) occur in extensive succession of massive or amygdaloidal lava flows with at least 370 m in thickness. The study of nine drill cores showed that basaltic rocks reached at least 369 m in thickness, in which 11 cycles marked by massive bases and tops with amygdaloidal and spilitization zones. The basalts are grayish green amygdaloidal, porphyritic, aphanitic or finegrained, and hypocrystalline. The primary igneous textures are largely amygdaloidal, intergranular and intersertal and rarely microporphyritic. The primary mineral assemblages consist predominantly of plagioclase (An 40-55) and augite (WOaverage = 37.7 %; ENaverage = 41.3 %; FSaverage = 21.0 %), and the mineral accessories are titanite, ilmenite, pyrite and magnetite.Albite, chlorite (brunsvigite), Fe-epidote, quartz and calcite are the main secondary minerals, being interpreted as products of seafloor hydrothermal alteration and/or sub-greenschist metamorphism. Generally, the studied volcanic rocks are characterized by SiO2 contents between 51.12 and 55.26%, high alkali contents (4.70 -7.50%) with K2O contents between 1.23 and 2.81 %, TiO2 (<1.0%) and respectively. In the classificatory diagrams, the samples plot into the basaltic andesite field, and the transitional and calc-alkaline fields. The primitive mantle normalized multi-element spiderdiagram of major and trace, and chondrite normalized rare earth elements diagrams, showed negative anomalies of Nb (Nb / Nb * = 0,05 -0,69) and Ti (Ti / Ti * = 0,31 -0,51), enrichment in rare earth elements , flat distribution of heavy rare earth elements (Gd / Ybcn = 1,14 -1,54) and moderate negative Eu anomalies (Eu / Eu * = 0.58 -0.97). The data obtained for the Sm-Nd system demonstrate model ages between 3.02 and 3.36 Ga, with negative ƐNd (t) ranging from -1.53 to -4.11, indicating that crustal contamination plays a fundamental role in the geochemistry of the studied rocks. SHRIMP zircon U-Pb dating indicates the crystallization ages of 2749 ± 6.5 and 2745 ± 5 Ma for volcanic mafic rocks. The Parauapebas Formation basalts were most likely produced within an intraplate tectonic setting, rather than in a subduction environment. Although this volcanism could be originated by the opening of a back-arc continental basin, a rift continental setting is more plausible on the basis of regional geology. Therefore, the Carajás Basin likely formed in an extensional regime related to the continental rift setting at ca. 2.75 Ga and later closed possibly by colisional process at the Neoarchean. The rifting process could be associated to a slab breakoff related to the Rio Maria-Carajás Collision.
