Interplay between supercontinents and accretionary orogens recorded in 200 million years of metallogeny

Yanbo Cheng, Phil Gilmore, Michael Doublier, Karol Czarnota, Chris Lewis, Holly Taylor, Andrew Clark, Liam Pitt, David Mole, Yue Wang, Sebastien Meffre, Adrienne Brotodewo, Ross Cayley, Cameron Cairns, Antony Burnham, Tom Wise

The assembly of supercontinents and the evolution of accretionary orogens are one of the most fundamental drivers of Earth's lithospheric architecture and mineral endowment. Here we reconstruct the 200 million years metallogenic history of the mainland Australian part of the Delamerian convergent margin, a pivotal segment of the East Gondwana paleo-Pacific margin that archives the transition from Rodinian fragmentation to terminal Gondwana assembly. Our analysis reveals that the region's mineral potential is a non-random result of sequential tectonic switching and specific magmatic priming. Magmatic fertility was governed by a narrow window of high hydration, deep-seated fractionation, and elevated oxidation states driven by the recycling of continental and oceanic sediments during multiple tectonic switching events. Integrated geological, geochemical, geochronological, and sulphur isotope evidence identifies four temporally distinct mineralisation events – from Neoproterozoic orthomagmatic Ni-Cu to Siluro-Devonian intrusion-related Au formations. Unlike the specialised “copper factories” of the Andes or the reduced magmatic systems of Japan, the Delamerian convergent margin functions as a diverse “general store” of strategic resources and critical minerals preserved beneath widespread post-mineralisation sedimentary cover. This 200 million years record demonstrates how the interactions between supercontinent and accretionary orogens are translated into four distinctive metallogenic belts within one coherent mineral province.