Carmenate, Alberto

Foster, David A.

Marsellos, Antonios

Min, Kyoungwon

Vogl, James J.

Passage of North America over the Yellowstone hotspot has had a profound inﬂ uence on the topography of the northern Rocky Mountains region. One of the most prominent hotspot-related topographic features is the Yellowstone crescent of high terrain, which consists of two elevated shoulders bounding the eastern Snake River Plain and converging at a topographic swell centered on the Yellowstone region. We have applied single-grain (U-Th)/He dating to apatites (AHe) collected from the Pioneer-Boulder Mountains on the northern arm of the Yel- lowstone crescent of high terrain to constrain the timing, rates, and spatial distribution of exhumation. These data provide constraints on the timing and processes responsible for uplift related to passage of the hotspot. The Pioneer-Boulder Mountains represent a topographic and structural culmination deﬁ ned by elevation and by the geometry of preserved strata of the Eocene Challis volcanic province. AHe ages indicate that ≥2–3 km of exhumation has occurred in the core of the Pioneer-Boulder Mountains culmination, where no Challis volcanics are preserved, since ca. 11 Ma. Challis volcanics are extensively preserved and Eocene topographic highs are locally preserved to the north and south of the Pioneer-Boulder Mountains, indicating minimal erosion in those areas. Age-elevation relationships suggest an exhumation rate of ~0.3 mm/yr between ca. 11 and 8 Ma for the culmination core; this relatively rapid interval of exhumation followed a period of &gt;30 m.y. during which little to no regional-scale exhumation occurred. Spatial patterns of both exhumation and topography indicate that faulting was not the primary control on uplift and exhumation of the culmination. Instead, NNW-trending normal faults are superimposed on the culmination, with the AHe ages from the footwall of the Copper Creek fault indicating that faulting began at or after ca. 10–9 Ma. Regional exhumation at 11–8 Ma was synchronous with silicic eruptions from the ca. 10.3 Ma Picabo volcanic ﬁ eld located immediately to the south and with S tilting of the southern ﬂ ank of the Pioneer-Boulder Mountains culmination, which was likely the result of loading of the eastern Snake River Plain by midcrustal maﬁ c intrusions. This synchroneity suggests a causal relationship between hotspot processes and exhu- mation through potential contributions of ﬂ exure and mantle dynamics to uplift, as well as changes in drainage networks and base leve

Miocene regional hotspot-related uplift, exhumation, and extension north of the Snake River Plain: evidence from apatite (U-Th)/He thermochronology

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