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Seawater cycled throughout Earth’s mantle in partially serpentinized lithosphere

Nature Geoscience volume 10, pages 222–228 (2017)Cite this article

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Abstract

The extent to which water and halogens in Earth’s mantle have primordial origins, or are dominated by seawater-derived components introduced by subduction is debated. About 90% of non-radiogenic xenon in the Earth’s mantle has a subducted atmospheric origin, but the degree to which atmospheric gases and other seawater components are coupled during subduction is unclear. Here we present the concentrations of water and halogens in samples of magmatic glasses collected from mid-ocean ridges and ocean islands globally. We show that water and halogen enrichment is unexpectedly associated with trace element signatures characteristic of dehydrated oceanic crust, and that the most incompatible halogens have relatively uniform abundance ratios that are different from primitive mantle values. Taken together, these results imply that Earth’s mantle is highly processed and that most of its water and halogens were introduced by the subduction of serpentinized lithospheric mantle associated with dehydrated oceanic crust.

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Figure 1: 206Pb/204Pb versus 87Sr/86Sr diagram for glasses included in this study.
Figure 2: The relative abundances of halogens and H2O in OIB and MORB glasses.
Figure 3: Log–log concentration plots showing the relative compatibilities of Cl and F.
Figure 4: The volatile, isotope and trace element systematics of the mantle.

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Acknowledgements

M.A.K. is supported by an Australian Research Council Future Fellowship (project number FT13 0100141). This work was made possible by several national funding agencies that have facilitated scientific cruises and sample recovery from the seafloor over many years. Grants to M.R.P. from the National Science Foundation funded field programmes where samples were collected from the East Pacific Rise, Juan de Fuca Ridge and Galapagos Spreading Centre. We gratefully acknowledge technical staff that made the reported measurements possible including X. Zhang, P. Holden and P. Tollan at the ANU.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Research School of Earth Sciences, Australian National University, 142 Mills Road, Acton, Australian Capital Territory 2601, Australia

    M. A. Kendrick

  2. Laboratoire Géosciences Océan, IUEM-UBO, Avenue Dumont d’Urville, 29280 Plouzané, France

    C. Hémond

  3. CODES and Earth Sciences, University of Tasmania, Tasmania 7001, Australia

    V. S. Kamenetsky & L. Danyushevsky

  4. GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, Wischhofstr. 1-3, 24148 Kiel, Germany

    C. W. Devey

  5. Central Science Laboratory, The University of Tasmania, Tasmania 7001, Australia

    T. Rodemann

  6. Department of Earth Science, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, California 93106-9630, USA

    M. G. Jackson

  7. Department of Geological Sciences, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida 32611, USA

    M. R. Perfit

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Contributions

M.A.K. conceived the project and undertook the majority of analyses. C.H. measured radiogenic isotopes in Foundation and St Helena samples at PSO-Brest and T.R. measured water by FT-IR at UTAS. C.H., V.S.K., C.W.D., L.D., M.G.J. and M.R.P. provided sample material and L.D. and V.S.K. provided major and/or trace element data associated with their samples. M.A.K. wrote the initial manuscript and incorporated comments from V.S.K., M.G.J., C.W.D., L.D., M.R.P. and C.H. into the final version.

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Correspondence to M. A. Kendrick.

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Kendrick, M., Hémond, C., Kamenetsky, V. et al. Seawater cycled throughout Earth’s mantle in partially serpentinized lithosphere. Nature Geosci 10, 222–228 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo2902

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