A positive test for the Greater Tarim Block at the heart of Rodinia: Mega-dextral suturing of supercontinent assembly.

The Tarim craton and neighboring terranes in Central Asia, i.e., the Greater Tarim Block (GTB), have been proposed to occupy a "missing-link" position at the heart of the Neoproterozoic Rodinia supercontinent between Australia and Laurentia. Such a reconstruction is tested with new paleomagnetic data from the GTB, and it is found that high-quality paleomagnetic poles conform to a stable missing-link configuration enduring from ca. 900 to 720 Ma. Integrating the new results with compilations of tectonomagmatic activity and geochronology throughout the GTB, we propose a novel paleogeographic model for Rodinia assembly. In our model, following initial phases of quasi-orthogonal subduction and collisions between southern GTB-Australia and northern GTB-Laurentia at =1070 Ma, the Rodinia supercontinent completed its assembly through a mega-dextral transpressional shearing along the Tarimian orogen. This scenario has noteworthy parallels to the history of collisions that created Pangea, and implies a more complicated geodynamic process for supercontinental assembly than previously proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]