Radiometric Dating of a Complex Polydeformational and Polymetamorphic Orogen, Central and Western New England

在新英格兰的中部和西部， 东印度造山作用参与了东部 早古生代时位于北美洲边缘。 传统上 这些都被视为单独的事件奥陶纪和晚 志留纪-早泥盆世。 最近的工作产生了 这一领域的一个模型，提出这两个事件是 实际上是一系列构造过程的一部分 古大西洋闭合的时候。 该研究将涉及 锆石、独居石、石英和磷灰石的U-Pb年代学研究 限制了佛蒙特州主要单位的原岩年龄， 马萨诸塞州和康涅狄格州，以及他们的高峰期 变质作用

In central and western New England both the Taconic and the Acadian orogenies were involved in the evolution of the eastern edge of North America during the lower Paleozoic. Traditionally these have been treated as separate events of Ordovician and Late Silurian-early Devonian age respectively. Recent work has produced a model for this area that proposes that the two events were actually part of a continuum of tectonic processes that operated as the ancient proto-Atlantic ocean closed. The study will involve U-Pb geochronology of zircons, monazites, sphenes and apatites to constrain both the protolith ages of key units in Vermont, Massachusetts and Connecticut, and the ages of their peak metamorphism.