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Survival times of anomalous melt inclusions from element diffusion in olivine and chromite

Abstract

The chemical composition of basaltic magma erupted at the Earth’s surface is the end product of a complex series of processes, beginning with partial melting and melt extraction from a mantle source and ending with fractional crystallization and crustal assimilation at lower pressures. It has been proposed that studying inclusions of melt trapped in early crystallizing phenocrysts such as Mg-rich olivine and chromite may help petrologists to see beyond the later-stage processes and back to the origin of the partial melts in the mantle1,2. Melt inclusion suites often span a much greater compositional range than associated erupted lavas, and a significant minority of inclusions carry distinct compositions that have been claimed to sample melts from earlier stages of melt production, preserving separate contributions from mantle heterogeneities1,2,3,4. This hypothesis is underpinned by the assumption that melt inclusions, once trapped, remain chemically isolated from the external magma for all elements except those that are compatible in the host minerals1,2. Here we show that the fluxes of rare-earth elements through olivine and chromite by lattice diffusion are sufficiently rapid at magmatic temperatures to re-equilibrate completely the rare-earth-element patterns of trapped melt inclusions in times that are short compared to those estimated for the production and ascent of mantle-derived magma5,6 or for magma residence in the crust7. Phenocryst-hosted melt inclusions with anomalous trace-element signatures must therefore form shortly before magma eruption and cooling. We conclude that the assumption of chemical isolation of incompatible elements in olivine- and chromite-hosted melt inclusions1,2 is not valid, and we call for re-evaluation of the popular interpretation that anomalous melt inclusions represent preserved samples of unmodified mantle melts.

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Figure 1: Chondrite-normalized REE plots of olivine- and chromite-hosted melt inclusions.
Figure 2: Measured element diffusion profiles from analytical traverses (obtained by laser ablation ICP-MS) across olivine grains.
Figure 3: Modelled re-equilibration times for REEs between a melt inclusion in an olivine grain and an external melt at 1,300 °C.

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Acknowledgements

M. Shelley, A. Norris and D. Scott are thanked for their help with the laser ablation ICP-MS analyses, electron microprobe analyses, and experimental set-up, respectively. This work was supported by an Australian Research Council Discovery Grant (to H.StC.O’N.).

Author Contributions C.S. prepared and performed the experiments, and H.StC.O’N. fitted the analytical data to obtain diffusion coefficients. C.S. and H.StC.O’N. conducted the microprobe and laser-ablation ICP MS analyses. V.K. characterized and supplied the sample of melt inclusion-bearing olivine phenocrysts. C.S. and H.StC.O’N. co-wrote the paper. All authors discussed the results and commented on the paper.

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Correspondence to C. Spandler or H. St C. O’Neill.

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This file contains Supplementary Notes, Supplementary Figures 1-2 with Legends, Supplementary Table 1 and additional references. (PDF 412 kb)

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Spandler, C., O’Neill, H. & Kamenetsky, V. Survival times of anomalous melt inclusions from element diffusion in olivine and chromite. Nature 447, 303–306 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature05759

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