AbstractAlkaline schorlitic tourmaline with domains of myrmekitic quartz and tourmaline intergrowths is reported for the first time from quartzo-feldspathic gneisses of the Tso Morari Crystalline Complex (TMCC), eastern Ladakh Himalaya. Except for schorlitic tourmaline, the brown-green dravitic tourmaline occurs in melanocratic layers of the gneiss. The schorlitic tourmaline contains REE-rich apatite, which is a typical mineral formed under high-pressure (HP) conditions. The observed myrmekite, marked by vermicular quartz and tourmaline intergrowths, was probably formed during decompression as a consequence of excess silica released from recrystallized tourmaline. The recalculated composition of the tourmaline with quartz myrmekite suggests that Si also occupied the tourmaline octahedral Z site during the HP regime. During decompression excess Si from this tourmaline was replaced by Mg and Fe3+. At an early stage of exhumation needle-shaped schorlitic tourmaline II and mosaic zoning were formed. The excess of silica and the structural disorder suggest that the Si-oversaturated tourmaline was stable at high-pressure–ultrahigh-pressure (HP–UHP) conditions. The greater stability of dravitic tourmaline compared to schorlitic tourmaline at HP conditions is evidently recorded at the TMCC. The tourmaline-bearing gneisses of the TMCC most probably shared the same metamorphic conditions during Tertiary collision of the Indian and Eurasian plates, similar to that observed for the associated UHP eclogites.
The metamorphism of the Tso Morari ultra-high pressure nappe of the Ladakh Himalaya
