Uranium Series Accessory Crystal Dating of Magmatic Processes

Complex and protracted crystallization histories over geologic timescales are recorded in accessory minerals (e.g., zircon, allanite). Although magmatic crystallization was traditionally assumed to occur essentially instantaneously for the purposes of interpreting mineral geochronometers with low absolute time resolution for ancient samples, it emerged relatively recently that magmatic crystallization can occur over extended durations. This discovery arose from applying high-spatial-resolution accessory mineral dating techniques for uranium series isotopes to young volcanic and cognate plutonic rocks. The emerging pattern from these studies is that individual crystals and crystal populations record crystallization episodes lasting from