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Melting during late-stage rifting in Afar is hot and deep

Nature volume 499, pages 70–73 (2013)Cite this article

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Abstract

Investigations of a variety of continental rifts and margins worldwide have revealed that a considerable volume of melt can intrude into the crust during continental breakup1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8, modifying its composition and thermal structure. However, it is unclear whether the cause of voluminous melt production at volcanic rifts is primarily increased mantle temperature or plate thinning1,2,8,9,10,11,12. Also disputed is the extent to which plate stretching or thinning is uniform or varies with depth with the entire continental lithospheric mantle potentially being removed before plate rupture13,14,15,16. Here we show that the extensive magmatism during rifting along the southern Red Sea rift in Afar, a unique region of sub-aerial transition from continental to oceanic rifting, is driven by deep melting of hotter-than-normal asthenosphere. Petrogenetic modelling shows that melts are predominantly generated at depths greater than 80 kilometres, implying the existence of a thick upper thermo-mechanical boundary layer in a rift system approaching the point of plate rupture. Numerical modelling of rift development shows that when breakup occurs at the slow extension rates observed in Afar, the survival of a thick plate is an inevitable consequence of conductive cooling of the lithosphere, even when the underlying asthenosphere is hot. Sustained magmatic activity during rifting in Afar thus requires persistently high mantle temperatures, which would allow melting at high pressure beneath the thick plate. If extensive plate thinning does occur during breakup it must do so abruptly at a late stage, immediately before the formation of the new ocean basin16.

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Figure 1: Map of the Dabbahu–Manda Hararo magmatic segment.
Figure 2: Trace-element compositions of mafic lavas from Afar.
Figure 3: Results of REE and rifting models.

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Acknowledgements

We acknowledge help and support by members of the NERC Afar Rift Consortium. This project was supported by a NERC consortium grant. D.J.F. acknowledges support from a LDEO postdoctoral fellowship.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, Columbia University, Palisades, 10964, New York, USA

    D. J. Ferguson & T. Plank

  2. Department of Earth Sciences, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EQ, UK,

    J. Maclennan

  3. Department of Earth Science and Engineering, Imperial College London, London SW7 2AZ, UK,

    I. D. Bastow

  4. Department of Earth Sciences, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3AN, UK,

    D. M. Pyle

  5. School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Science, University of Birmingham, Birmingham B15 2TT, UK,

    S. M. Jones

  6. National Oceanography Centre Southampton, University of Southampton, Southampton SO14 3ZH, UK,

    D. Keir

  7. Department of Earth Sciences, University of Bristol, Bristol BS8 1RJ, UK,

    J. D. Blundy

  8. Department of Earth Sciences, Addis Ababa University, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

    G. Yirgu

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Contributions

D.J.F., D.M.P., J.D.B. and G.Y. planned the project and conducted fieldwork in Afar. Geochemical analysis and modelling was by D.J.F., J.M., D.M.P., J.D.B. and T.P. and S.M.J. did the numerical rifting model. D.J.F. took the lead in writing the manuscript with contributions from I.D.B., J.M., D.K., S.M.J. and others.

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Correspondence to D. J. Ferguson.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Ferguson, D., Maclennan, J., Bastow, I. et al. Melting during late-stage rifting in Afar is hot and deep. Nature 499, 70–73 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature12292

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