Metallogenic Evolution of Northeast Asia Related to the Cretaceous Turn of Geological Evolution
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Dears,
the manuscript is a compilation of previous works on several mineralization events and the correlation between those intense time of mineralization with specific galactic position of the planet earth from Nechaev et al., 2018.
The manuscript do not present any new data (which is not mandatory looking at the journal's policies) and the largest portion of it deals with the geological description of mineralization events from previous works (from section 3.2.1 to the conclusions).
The manuscript has been drafted to fit into Mineral's special Issue: Geological Evolution of The Cretaceous and Associated, which fits greatly. However, I miss to see the correlation between the events (i.e. the galactic influence and the mineralizations and/or geodynamic changes that brought to the mineralizations).
With no new data, no new methodologies been used there is little to revise directly into the manuscript, so if someone has to address comments, these would be on the concept of the paper and I see two main flaws:
1- the whole idea is backed up by just one reference and it is a work from the same first author of this manuscript (this is a personal opinion of mine, openly disputable, but I had to say it. It is an ethical comment more than something that needs to be addresses, I apologize if this may disturb the authors, but again, I had to say it).
2- the peak of the summer season described in Nechaev et al., 2018 is restricted between c. 135 and 120 Ma, whereas here it goes from 174 to 96 Ma (which yes, it is Cretaceous, although it would not really fit with the only ref that makes the backbone of this manuscript).
3- out of the many mineralization events provided in the supplementary table, only very few yield the crystallization/mineralization age (which should be sitting in between the c. 15 Ma time window described in the Nechaev et al., 2018 manuscript) so it is not possible for the reader to make any hard comparison
4- The late diagenetic events that may be the driving agents behind the economically relevant crystallizations are not discussed enough, again not possible for the reader to correlate the influence of the galactic position of the earth with the mineralizations.
I do apologize if I missed the point the authors wanted to let through the reader, I do not think that at this stage this manuscript is fit for publication though.
However, I understand this draft is intended for a special edit, and I'll leave the editor free to discard my review if this does not fit the required standard for this special edit.
Comments for author File: 
Comments.pdf
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
This article is presented as a follow-up to Nechaev et al. (2018) 'The Cretaceous Turn of Geological Evolution: Key Evidence from East Asia' published in Acta Geologica Sinica (English edition). The Introduction reiterates the galactic orbit scenario and main findings of their 2018 article. Tectonic maps are presented for pre-, syn- and post-Cretaceous Russian Far East palaeogeographic reconstructions, followed by histograms showing corresponding age distributions of classified deposit types from the database. The article then provides accounts of the main deposits summarising (from diverse cited publications) their characteristics and geochemical features that support the tectonic interpretations. These descriptions and supporting figures are, in many cases, more accessible published in 'Minerals' than was the original publication.
The manuscript does not refer to how the many ore deposits in the database were categorized into collision-related, subduction-related and plume- & transform plate boundary related. Is this classification adopted from the database-compilers (refs 3 & 4), or were the tectonic settings ascribed to deposits by the current authors? How certain are the authors of the ascribed affiliations? They are a matter of interpretation and presumably there is scope for human bias and perhaps 'wishful thinking' in this process. This needs to be discussed in the article.
There is little doubt that a mantle plume in the Cretaceous was responsible for formation of widespread adakitic intrusions and associated mineralization in NE Asia. However, one mantle plume (even if a 'superplume') in one region of the Earth hardly justifies the global/galactic attribution made in the title and introduction to the article. The final sentence in section 3 acknowledges that other researchers do not share the authors' galactic connection in explaining the magmatic and metallogenic features of NE Asia. I recommend that the authors add at least one sentence here to acknowledge that, while their study does not contradict their galactic-based 'Cretaceous Turn of Geological Evolution' theory, far more evidence is required to link Cretaceous mantle plume activity globally to the galactic orbit cycle as outlined in the Introduction.
Recommended corrections:
Line 37 - add closing parenthesis to the quotation
Line 129 - change 'richest' to 'richer'
Line 144 - in this paragraph, explain the categorization of deposits as represented in Fig. 4 into collision-related, subduction-related and plume- & transform plate boundary related, and address the issues raised by the reviewer about the certainty of this classification.
Lines 146-147 - reword, as I do not understand this sentence: 'The rare plume-related settings are associated with intra-plate magmatism that is a reasonable link.' Reasonable link to what?
Line 177 improve English: 'Russian Far East, the geology of which is familiar to...'
Line 355 - improve English of '...their ideas seem close to that, at least, do not contradict that' (avoid using 'that' in this context)
Lines 364-365 - duplication of 'numerous': remove one of these words
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
1 I suggest the authors to introduce the hypothesis ‘Cretaceous turn of geological evolution’ so that the readers can make sense about the relationship between Cretaceous turn of geological evolution and large-scale metallogeny in NE Asia.
2 It remains unclear how the superplume activity can lead to flattening of the oceanic slab and the resultant large-scale adakitic magmatism. Also, the typical adakites such as the Yanji Palaeocene adakitic andesites in NE Asia was formed by mixing between mantle-derived high-Mg andesite and crust-derived felsic melt (Guo et al., 2007, J Petrol, 48, 661-692). Furthermore, most adakitic rocks in eastern China are related to melting of thickened continental crust instead of oceanic slab (e.g., Guo et al., 2006; Liu et al., 2010, GCA; Ma et al., 2015, EPSL). I suggest the authors to discuss this issue in more detail and more references should be cited.
3 Most of plume-related rocks such as the Raohe complex (ca. 170 Ma), were formed in Jurassic rather than in Cretaceous. The largest igneous province of Ontong-Java was formed during 125-90 Ma, which is also later than the peak stage of mineralization.
4 Line 288, It should be Figure 9, and the rest of figures should be renamed!
Some related publications:
Guo, F., Fan, W.M., Li, C.W., 2006. Geochemistry of late Mesozoic adakites from the Sulu belt, eastern China: magma genesis and implications for crustal recycling beneath continental collisional orogens. Geological Magazine, 143, 1-13.
Guo, F., Nakamura, E., Fan, W.M., Kobayoshi, K., Li, C.W., 2007. Generation of Palaeocene Adakitic Andesites by Magma Mixing; Yanji Area, NE China. Journal of Petrology, 48, 661–692.
Liu, S.A., Li, S.G., He, Y.S., Huang, F., 2010. Geochemical contrasts between early Cretaceous ore-bearing and ore-barren high-Mg adakites in central-eastern China: Implications for petrogenesis and Cu–Au mineralization. Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta, 74, 7160-7178.
Ma, Q., Zheng, J.P., Xu, Y.G., Griffin, W.L., Zhang, R.S., 2015. Are continental “adakites” derived from thickened or foundered lower crust? Earth and Planetary Science Letters, 419, 125-133.
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
definitely much improved, appreciate the comments and I think it is definitely ready for poublication
