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Title: Quantifying melt production and degassing rate at mid-ocean ridges from global mantle convection models with plate motion history

Journal Article · · Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1002/2016GC006439· OSTI ID:1480728
 [1];  [2];  [1];  [3];  [4];  [5]
  1. Univ. of Colorado, Boulder, CO (United States)
  2. City Univ. (CUNY), NY (United States); Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA (United States)
  3. Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA (United States)
  4. Portland State Univ., Portland, OR (United States)
  5. Johns Hopkins Univ., Baltimore, MD (United States)
+ Show Author Affiliations

The Earth's surface volcanism exerts first-order controls on the composition of the atmosphere and the climate. On Earth, the majority of surface volcanism occurs at mid-ocean ridges. In this study, based on the dependence of melt fraction on temperature, pressure, and composition, we compute melt production and degassing rate at mid-ocean ridges from three-dimensional global mantle convection models with plate motion history as the surface velocity boundary condition. By incorporating melting in global mantle convection models, we connect deep mantle convection to surface volcanism, with deep and shallow mantle processes internally consistent. We compare two methods to compute melt production: a tracer method and an Eulerian method. Our results show that melt production at mid-ocean ridges is mainly controlled by surface plate motion history, and that changes in plate tectonic motion, including plate reorganizations, may lead to significant deviation of melt production from the expected scaling with seafloor production rate. We also find a good correlation between melt production and degassing rate beneath mid-ocean ridges. The calculated global melt production and CO2 degassing rate at mid-ocean ridges varies by as much as a factor of 3 over the past 200 Myr. We show that mid-ocean ridge melt production and degassing rate would be much larger in the Cretaceous, and reached maximum values at ~150–120 Ma. Our results raise the possibility that warmer climate in the Cretaceous could be due in part to high magmatic productivity and correspondingly high outgassing rates at mid-ocean ridges during that time.

Research Organization:
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC)
Grant/Contract Number:
AC02-05CH11231
OSTI ID:
1480728
Journal Information:
Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems, Vol. 17, Issue 7; ISSN 1525-2027
Publisher:
American Geophysical UnionCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 18 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

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Cited By (3)

Controls on Global Mantle Convective Structures and Their Comparison With Seismic Models journal August 2019
Potential links between continental rifting, CO2 degassing and climate change through time journal November 2017
Anomalous K-Pg–aged seafloor attributed to impact-induced mid-ocean ridge magmatism journal February 2018

Figures / Tables (12)

Table 1.(p. 3)table Table 1.
Table 2.(p. 4)table Table 2.
Figure 1.(p. 5)figure Figure 1.
Table 3.(p. 5)table Table 3.
Figure 2.(p. 8)figure Figure 2.
Figure 3.(p. 9)figure Figure 3.
Figure 4.(p. 10)figure Figure 4.
Figure 5.(p. 11)figure Figure 5.
Figure 6.(p. 12)figure Figure 6.
Figure 7.(p. 13)figure Figure 7.
Figure 8.(p. 15)figure Figure 8.
Figure 9.(p. 16)figure Figure 9.

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Related Subjects

58 GEOSCIENCES
melt production
degassing rate
mid-ocean ridges