U-Pb analyses were carried out on detrital zircon grains from major river-mouth sediments draining South Korea to infer provenance characteristics and the crustal growth history of the southern Korean Peninsula, using a laser ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometer (LA-ICP-MS). The Korean Peninsula is located in the East Asian continental margin and mainly comprises three Precambrian massifs and two metamorphic belts in between them. We obtained 515 concordant to slightly discordant zircon ages ranging from ca. 3566 to ca. 48 Ma. Regardless of river-mouth location, predominance of Mesozoic (249–79 Ma) and Paleoproterozoic (2491–1691 Ma) ages with subordinate Archean ages indicates that the zircon ages reflect present exposures of plutonic/metamorphic rocks in the drainage basins of the South Korean rivers and the crustal growth of the southern Korean Peninsula was focused in these two periods. Comparison of detrital zircon-age data between the North and South Korean river sediments reveals that the Paleoproterozoic zircon age distributions of both regions are nearly identical, while the Neoproterozoic–Paleozoic ages exist and the Mesozoic ages are dominant in southern Korean Peninsula. This result suggests that Precambrian terrains in Korea record the similar pre-Mesozoic magmatic history and that the influence of Mesozoic magmatism was mainly focused in South Korea

: The Sindong Group (Aptian–Albian) in southeastern Korea is a 2–3-km-thick fluvio-lacustrine sedimentary package deposited in an elongated basin (the Nakdong Trough), which was formed by extension in an active-continental-margin setting. The provenance of the Sindong Group was studied to understand spatial and temporal variation in composition in three different parts of the basin by using integrated data on petrography, quartz SEM-cathodoluminescence (CL) analysis, and zircon Zr/Hf analysis. Although Sindong Group sandstones display wide variation in the composition of framework grains, they generally have increasing amounts of feldspar and decreasing amounts of quartz up sequence. Significant amounts of volcanic rock fragments and volcanic quartz are observed in the late-stage sediments. Metamorphic quartz is predominant in all Sindong Group sandstones, indicative of the exposure of metamorphic rocks in the source terrane, mostly from Precambrian basement and Triassic granites. The occurrence of significant amounts of plutonic quartz from early-stage sediments suggests that Jurassic granites were widely exposed in the source terranes. In addition, the episodic increase in volume of plutonic quartz content in the sequence, especially in the northern part of the basin, suggests that episodic tectonic activity occurred in the catchment. The increasing feldspar content up sequence could support the occurrence of tectonic activity in the catchments. The Zr/Hf analysis of detrital zircons revealed that the majority of zircons are of continental-crust origin formed in orogenic settings, but zircons in the lowest strata in the northern part of the basin were derived largely from anorogenic magmatic rocks of mantle origin. Our results demonstrate that source terranes for the Sindong Group have heterogeneous spatial and temporal distribution and were composed mainly of Precambrian basement and Triassic to Jurassic granitic rocks, with minor (meta)sedimentary rocks and syndepositional volcanic rocks. The detritus derived from syndepositional volcanic rocks became significant in the late stage of basin filling, representing the transition from extensional tectonism to continental-arc magmatism. The differences in characteristics of quartz SEM-CL and zircon Zr/Hf ratios in different parts of the basin are best explained by deposition on different alluvial fans and river systems.