Granulite xenoliths from Cenozoic basalts in SE China provide geochemical fingerprints to distinguish lower crust terranes from the North and South China tectonic blocks: comment

North China and South China collision: Insights from analogue modeling

“…The UHP eclogite xenoliths of subducted South China have been discovered within North China west of the Tanlu fault zone (the filled triangle in Fig. 1; Xu et al, 2002;Wang et al, 2002;Zhang, 2004). This, along with recent paleomagnetic (e.g., Gilder et al, 1999) and seismic profiling (e.g., Xu et al, 2001;Yang, 2002;Yuan et al, 2003) studies, indicates South China was underthrust westwards along the Dabie-Tanlu-Sulu zone, as proposed by Zhang (1997Zhang ( , 2000Zhang ( , 2002.…”

“…across the Honam zone suggest a geologic history similar to South China for them (Cheong et al, 2000). Accordingly, the Honam zone is not a boundary between North China and South China and is not a counterpart of the Tanlu fault, but an intraplate rift zone (Cheong et al, 2000;Chough et al, 2000), and southern Korea tectonically belongs to South China (Cheong et al, 2000;Chough et al, 2000;Zhang, 1997Zhang, , 2000Zhang, , 2002Zhang, , 2004. These facts seriously undermine the basis of the models of both Yin and Nie (1993) and Li (1994).…”

“…In these three models, the Tanlu fault zone was proposed to be created by the collision. In contrast, in earlier works (Zhang, 1997(Zhang, , 2000(Zhang, , 2002(Zhang, , 2004Zhang et al, in press), the senior author proposed that the North and South China blocks are divided by the Tanlu-Sulu-Imjingang zones with the whole of South Korea tectonically belonging to the South China block (Fig. 1), and the North China block as a rigid promontory penetrates the South China block oblique to the Tanlu fault (Fig.…”

“…The South China block is a continent predominantly bearing Proterozoic metamorphic basement (e.g., Chen and Jahn, 1998;Zhang, 2004), although Archean basement is locally exposed in its northern margin (Qiu et al, 2000;Zhang, 2004). This continent could have undergone poly-phase tectonothermal events during Phanerozoic time in spite Fig.…”

Was the easternmost segment of the Central Asian Orogenic Belt derived from Gondwana or Siberia: An intriguing dilemma?

“…It was renamed the Qingling-Dabie-Tanlu-SuluImjiangang-Yanji zone (Zhang, 1997(Zhang, , 2004Zhang et al, 2006) and this interpretation was supported by Oh (2006) and Oh et al (2006Oh et al ( , 2009) based on an evaluation of the Korean data. Tsujimori (2001, 2003) further suggested that the Yanji zone could be linked with the Heilongjiang blueschist belt (Yanji-Heilongjiang HP belt; see Figs.…”