Petrogenetic controls on the origin of tourmalinite veins from Mandrolisai igneous massif (central Sardinia, Italy): Insights from tourmaline crystal chemistry

An inclusive study of tourmaline, a well-known petrogenetic indicator, allowed the reconstruction of late-stage evolution of B-bearing Variscan granodioritic magmas in Sardinia batholith (Italy). Tourmaline samples from Mandrolisai igneous massif were chemically and structurally investigated by electron microprobe analysis, single-crystal X-ray diffraction, Mössbauer, infrared and optical absorption spectroscopy. Tourmaline aggregates occur both as large crystals displaying graphic textures with quartz, in aplite layers and pegmatite dykes within tonalitic granodiorite, and as fine-grained assemblages, in tourmalinite veins crystallized along fractures within metamorphic country rocks. Tourmaline was identified as schorl in pegmatites and as dravite in veins, both with relevant foitite and magnesio-foitite components. Petrological and mineralogical constraints based on mineral oxythermobarometry and tourmaline crystal chemistry converged towards crystallization temperatures in the range 650–400 °C at about 2.2 kbar, under NNO conditions that remained almost unvaried during the whole magma crystallization path. In the reconstructed scenario, Mandrolisai tourmaline recorded the late stages of consolidation of a single granodioritic magma batch, whose crystallization path locally led to residual concentration of B in the melt. Due to melt/hydrous fluid immiscibility processes, B enrichment promoted the crystallization of the large tourmaline + quartz assemblages in pegmatites. Late B-bearing fluids triggered metasomatic reactions and favored the precipitation of fine-grained tourmaline in tourmalinite veins under a brittle solid-state regime, which overprinted a fracture network of the country rocks previously formed under magmatic flow conditions. Mandrolisai granodiorites are metaluminous (ASI = 0.93–0.95), that is far from the compositional characters of typical B-bearing magmas, mostly felsic and markedly peraluminous (ASI > 1.2). The uncommon occurrence of tourmaline-bearing rocks in Mandrolisai may be an evidence of the limited control exerted by Al2O3 saturation on the origin of tourmaline. Conversely, a more important role of B contents, likely coming from crustal sources, may be invoked for tourmaline saturation in the magma.