College of Earth Sciences, Jilin University, Changchun 130061, China

  South Tianshan–Solonker suture, is the largest and southernmost suture within the Central Asian orogenic belt (CAOB). It records the ultimate collision between Tarim–North China cratons and Siberia craton, and is commonly interpreted as marking the eventual closure of Paleo-Asian Ocean. South Tianshan suture belongs to the western segment of the suture zone, and its evolutionary features are important for defining the formation age of the South Tianshan–Solonker suture. In this paper, the authors review the geochronological, geochemical, petrographic, and paleontological evidence within South Tianshan suture to delineate its formation era and closure characteristics, and thus further revealing the ultimate evolutionary pattern of the western segment of Paleo-Asian Ocean. This suture records strong plate collision before Late Carboniferous, forming a series of high-pressure metamorphic rocks, characterized by the presence of blue schist, eclogite and mica schist. In Permian, the whole area was under a relatively stable post-orogenic setting, with the formation of bimodal volcanic rocks, post-collisional granites, and terrestrial molasses. Sedimentary facies gradually changed from marine to either lacustrine or fluvial during this period. An Early Permian granite dike crosscuts the HP metamorphic belt, and the HP metamorphic rocks also underwent retrograde metamorphism at this time, indicating the formation of the South Tianshan suture was earlier than Permian. Hence, the western section of Paleo-Asian Ocean closed during Late Carboniferous, and Tarim Craton moved northward to collide with Kazakhstan–Yili Block, leading to the formation of the South Tianshan suture