20
February 2003
Ocean ridges: Just add water
Water has a considerable influence on geochemical and geophysical processes in the upper mantle and it has been suggested that volcanic regions such as those in Hawaii and Iceland are not only hotspots but wet spots. But the effects of variations in water content has not been included in most models of mantle melting. A quantitative model of ridge melting now shows that a number of previously enigmatic aspects of crustal melting, such as the composition of volcanic rocks at mid-ocean ridge hotspots, can be explained by adding water to the mix.
The importance of water to oceanic mantle melting regimes
P. D. ASIMOW & C. H. LANGMUIR
Nature 421,
815–820 (2003); doi:10.1038/nature01429
| Summary
| Full Text (HTML
/ PDF) |