Post-metamorphic exposure history of schists with in the engizek metamorphics (Ekinözü, Kahramanmaraş)

The Engizek Metamorphics forms the lower metamorphic slice together with Bitlis and Pütürge metamorphics within the Southeast Anatolian Orogenic Belt. The unit was subducted beneath the Malatya-Keban-Binboğa metamorphics following the subduction of the oceanic crust between these units during the late Cretaceous. In this study, LA-ICP-MS zircon U-pb and Low-Temperature Thermochronology (LTT) dating techniques applied on the samples collected from the Yoncayolu Formation of the Engizek Metamorphics. The youngest zircon age population in the Yoncayolu Formation is Upper Triassic (224 Ma – Norian), whereas the unit includes the Lower Paleocene metamorphic zircons. The source of the Yoncayolu Formation includes zircons from Variscan Orogeny and Arabian-Nubiban Shield as major components. The zircon U-Th/He ages vary from 45 to 42 Ma, the apatite Fission Track ages vary from 29 to 18 Ma and the apatite U-Th/He ages vary from 23 to 7 Ma. These results suggest that the region exhumed in an extensional setting during the middle Eocene and continued exhumation during Oligocene to Miocene related to the growth of the accretionary prism, and finally, uplift rate increased in a compressional setting as a result of the continental collision during Miocene.