The Moon has a magmatic and thermal history that is distinct from that of the terrestrial planets1. Radioisotope dating of lunar samples suggests that most lunar basaltic magmatism ceased by around 2.9–2.8 billion years ago (Ga)2,3, although younger basalts between 3 Ga and 1 Ga have been suggested by crater-counting chronology, which has large uncertainties owing to the lack of returned samples for calibration4,5. Here we report a precise lead–lead age of 2,030 ± 4 million years ago for basalt clasts returned by the Chang’e-5 mission, and a 238U/204Pb ratio (µ value)6 of about 680 for a source that evolved through two stages of differentiation. This is the youngest crystallization age reported so far for lunar basalts by radiometric dating, extending the duration of lunar volcanism by approximately 800–900 million years. The µ value of the Chang’e-5 basalt mantle source is within the range of low-titanium and high-titanium basalts from Apollo sites (µ value of about 300–1,000), but notably lower than those of potassium, rare-earth elements and phosphorus (KREEP) and high-aluminium basalts7 (µ value of about 2,600–3,700), indicating that the Chang’e-5 basalts were produced by melting of a KREEP-poor source. This age provides a pivotal calibration point for crater-counting chronology in the inner Solar System and provides insight on the volcanic and thermal history of the Moon.
Ophiolites that crop out in Southeast Asia represent the relics of the Tethys Ocean, which existed between the continents of Gondwana and Laurasia during much of the Mesozoic. Two ophiolite belts in Myanmar, i.e., the Eastern Belt and the Western Belt, have been conventionally regarded as parts of a single suture connecting with the Yarlung-Tsangpo suture in the Tibetan Plateau and displaced by the dextral Sagaing fault. Here we present for the first time a combined analysis of zircon secondary ion mass spectrometry U-Pb ages and Hf-O isotopes of two Myanmar ophiolites, the Kalaymyo ophiolite from the Western Belt and the Myitkyina ophiolite from the Eastern Belt. Our results show that the Kalaymyo ophiolite has an Early Cretaceous age (ca. 127 Ma), coeval with Neo-Tethyan ophiolites along the Yarlung-Tsangpo suture. In contrast, the Myitkyina ophiolite was formed during the Middle Jurassic (ca. 173 Ma) and thus the Eastern Belt is the southern continuation of the Meso-Tethyan Bangong-Nujiang suture in the Tibetan Plateau. Consequently, we argue that the two Myanmar ophiolite belts belong to two different sutures of the Meso-Tethys and Neo-Tethys, and that the boundary between the Sibumasu and west Burma blocks is a Jurassic suture rather than a transcurrent shear zone.
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