Oceanic_Lithosphere

Page 1

The Oceanic Lithosphere Three-Fifths of the surface of the solid earth is oceanic lithosphere, all of which has been formed during the last 160 Ma at the midocean ridges. Understanding the structure of the oceanic lithosphere and the midocean ridges is particularly important because it provides a key to understanding the mantle.

Chapter 8

The Solid Earth An Introduction to Global Geophysics C Mary R Fowler


Beneath the Waves

The Sea Floor Mid Ocean Ridges

Ocean Basins

Continental Margins

Oceanic Trenches

Ocean Basin

MOR

Observe the Topography


Mid Ocean Ridges: - Chain of undersea mountains - Total length of over 60,000 km - Typical height of more than 3 km above ocean basins - Hundreds of kilometer wide - Marks CONSTRUCTIVE BOUNDARIES of Plates Hot material rises from the asthesnosphere along the axis of the midocean ridges and fills the space left by the separating plates; as the material cols it becomes a part of the plates. - Spreading Centers:

approx spreading rates: 0.5 – 10 cm.yr

- Width of the ridge is proportional to its spreading rate.


Variable rates of spreading are evident in the map of crustal age. Spreading rate ranges from 2 cm/y on Mid-Atlantic Ridge to ~20 cm/y on fastest parts of East Pacific Rise.


Spreading rate and Topography (Ruggedness)

Fast Spreading--Southern East Pacific Rise from 13 to 23째S


Medium Spreading--Juan de Fuca Ridge near 48째N


Slow Spreading--Mid Atlantic Ridge near 22째N


Mean Bathymetric Depth (d) depends on age (t) of the oceanic lithosphere: For Sea floor younger than 70 Ma: d = 2.5 + 0.35 t ½ And Older than 70 Ma: d = 6.4 – 3.2 e –t / 62.8 Where: d is in km and t is in Million Years Oceanic Trenches: -Marks the surface location of the subduction zone. - one plate overrides the other.


Ocean Basins: - Almost flat lying regions of the seabed, - thousands of kilometer in width and 5-6 km below MSL. - Isolated volcanic islands occur in most of the oceans, often in chains: helps in plate motion determination. - Such Island chain apparently forms when a plate passes over a ‘hot spot’: a localized region where magma is rising from deep in the mantle. - Aseismic ridges (not tectonically active) are submarine volcanic mountain chains, typically elevated some 2-4 km above the seabed.


Continental Margins: Marks the transition between the continent and ocean floor.

Active Margin: Passive Margin:

- Continental Shelf is often very

- continental shelf Æ slope Æ rise

narrow - So called because of the Igneous and tectonic activities along this margin ( plate boundary)

Transform Fault:

Subduction Zone:

- Seabed drops

- Trench typically many kilometers deep.

rapidly from shelf to oceanic depths.


Oceanic plate is subducted back into the asthenosphere at trenches Frictional heating along the plate boundary gives rise to arc volcanism

passive margin between the ocean crust and continental margin

Genesis of the lithosphere at a mid-ocean ridge Spreading causes the ocean basin to grow

Fig.19-3, pg 461: Press, F. and Siever, R. (1978) Earth (second edition). W.H. Freeman, SanFrisco.


Oceanic Crust Layer-1: Sediments Layer-2: Volcanic Layer: pillow and sheet lavas (rapidly cooled) Layer 3: Oceanic Layer (plutonic): Gabbros (slowly cooled) and dikes feeder zones for magma to rise to surface. Layer-4: upper mantle.


Oceanic Upper Mantle - Seismic P-wave velocity in the uppermost oceanic mantle average 8.1 km/s - Crust-Mantle boundary: Seismic Moho: basaltic-gabbroic crust to peridotite mantle. Petrological Moho: Cumulate ultramafic rock (dunite) and underlying deformed residual upper mantle (tectinite ultramafic) - Gradual increase of seismic P-wave velocity with depth in the oceanic upper mantle: 0.01 km/s per kilometer of depth. - Anisotropic upper mantle (azimuthal anisotropy): Fast axis Æ Perpendicular to the ridge axis Æ preferred aligning of olivine crystals in the mantle parallel to the flow direction Slow axis Æ parallel to the ridge axis - Rayleigh wave phase velocity dispersion modeling Æ lithospheric thickness dependant on age: 30 km at 5 Ma, 100km at 100 Ma. - S-wave velocity increases from 4.1 km/s to 4.3 km/s with age.


Deep Structure of Mid Ocean Ridges - Free-air gravity anomaly across the MOR is not zero Æ the ridge is not in total isostatic equilibrium. - Partial compensation is attained by presence of low density material in the upper mantle beneath the ridge. HOW DEEP DO THIS ZONE OF LOW DENSITY EXTEND? 200-250 kms. Evidences: Seismological Studies of the Mid Atlantic Ridge: - low P-wave velocity zone extending upto 250 km and few hundred kms wide - 3D S-wave velocity imaging: S-wave reduced by 2-8%, depth extent 250 km. - teleseimic data analysis Æ reported ‘Gap in Lithosphere’ beneath MOR system Æ inefficient Sn propagation. - Frequently Surface waves observed from MOR earthquakes without body waves - Presence of an absorptive zone in the upper mantle beneath the MOR.


Detailed Studies of source mechanism of large, ridge axis earthquakes: - all the foci are extremely shallow (1-6 km) - located beneath the median valley - mechanism nearly pure normal faulting on planes dipping at 45Âş with strike parallel to the local trend of the ridge axis. - Focal depths decrease with increasing spreading rate

Æ consistent with the theory that the maximum hypocentral depth is representative of the depth at which the lithosphere ceases to deform in a brittle manner and ductile deformation takes over. Effects of temperature (melting) on seismic velocities: Over the liquidus-solidus temperature range Basalt P-wave velocity decreases from 5.5 km/s to about 3.5 km/s Peridotite P-wave velocity decreases from 7.5 km/s to 5.5 km/s Partial melting has large effect on seismic velocity and attenuation even at low melt %.


Framework for Heat and Mass Transfer Through the Oceanic Crust

• melting of mantle rock • heat transfer from magma bodies • convection in liquids and in porous rock • fluxes of hydrothermally-derived heat and material


Mantle Circulation This schematic provides a plate scale view of the system of mantle convection: Upwelling Æ melting Æ crust formation beneath Mid Ocean ridge.

Solidus of unmelted mantle material

Partially molten magma escapes from this region to form the crust

Figure 7-1, from D.R. Scott and D.J. Stevenson (1989) A self-consistent model of melting, magma migration and buoyancy-driven circulation beneath mid-ocean ridges. J. Geophys. Res., 94, 2973-2988.


Melt that reaches the crust has its origin in the mantle, with melting occurring as ascending mantle material adiabatically decompresses. In this model 1.

asthenospheric material upwells beneath the ridge axis

2.

melting is supported by solid material undergoing adiabatic decompression, crossing the solidus at depth zsol. (The solidus is the P/T condition at which melting begins for a material of a given composition).

3.

crustal formation occurs

4.

melt is supplied to form the crust in a narrow zone near to the axis of spreading; on a time-averaged basis this supply must support Vszc of crustal generation

5.

the chemistry of basalts suggests that melting is incomplete, that the magmas are differentiated from their mantle source. The degree of melting that can be accommodated is Ftot =20 (+/-10) %

6.

The variables which are poorly constrained are the velocity of the upwelling mantle, Vu , and the width of the zone of upwelling, xu.


The rate of melting has to balance crustal formation (all melt rises to the surface, because only cooling will stop it), and so:

-The simplest model for mantle convection involves a diverging plate overlying a semi-infinite medium of constant viscosity. - This model predicts that Vs ~Vu . Thus the zone of upwelling is predicted to be rather wide, about 30 km. - One of the central issues in contemporary studies of mantle circulation and its relationship to crustal construction is how to focus the melt from this wide zone of melting into a narrow zone of volcanism.


To understand the parameter zsol, we can examine the relationship of an adiabat to the solidus for mantle rock. As a function of temperature and pressure: -The solidus for mantle material has a slope of about 12째C/kbar - An adibat in the mantle has a slope of about 1째C/kbar, hence these eventually cross and melting begins. Once within the field of melting, the effect of the negative heat of melting is to cause the temperature decrease with decreasing pressure to be steeper than the adiabat. The temperature of the mantle controls both the depth at which melting begins and the fraction of melt generated.

Path B

Path A

Figure 7-2, from D.R. Scott and D.J. Stevenson (1989) A self-consistent model of melting, magma migration and buoyancy-driven circulation beneath mid-ocean ridges. J. Geophys. Res., 94, 2973-2988.


These thermodynamic relationships can be superimposed on the physical model:

When the mantle is cold, melting is initiated at shallower depth and over a narrower zone. A thin crust is generated and the depletion in the residual mantle is minimal. When the mantle is hot, melting is initiated at greater depth and over a wider zone. A thick crust is created and there are greater chemical changes in the residual mantle which extend to greater depth. Figure 7-3, from D.R. Scott and D.J. Stevenson (1989) A self-consistent model of melting, magma migration and buoyancy-driven circulation beneath mid-ocean ridges. J. Geophys. Res., 94, 2973-2988.


Melting under Mid Ocean Ridges - Ridges are mostly passive structures - Interior of mantle is so hot that mantle rocks brought to the surface (1 atmosphere) without temperature loss (adiabatic decompression) will melt. - Fertile mantle will always melt when brought up adiabatically to 40 km or less below the surface. - Upwelling must occur under any rift, to fill the vacated space: If the extension on rifting is infinite, the melting produces a MOR. - McKenzie and Bickle (1988) modeled this melting by finding expression for the solidus and liquidus temperatures of upwelling mantle and for degree of melting in typical mantle material raised to a given pressure and temperature. Assumed fertile mantle as garnet peridotite and found for the solidus temperature Ts:

P = [(Ts – 1100)/136] + 4.968 x 10-4 e 0.012 (Ts-1100) For the liqudus temperature Tl :

Tl = 1736.2 + 4.343P + 180 tan-1 (P/2.2169) Where P is the pressure in GPa and Ts and Tl the solidus and liquidus temperatures in ÂşC.


Defined a dimensionless temperature, T’ T’ = [T - ( Ts + Tl)/2] / (Tl - Ts) The degree of melting, as a fraction by weight of the rock, x, is given by: x – 0.5 = T’ + (T’2 – 0.25)(0.4256 + 2.988 T’) Surprisingly, there was no clear evidence for variation of x(T’) with pressure.

To generate the 7 km thick oceanic crust, 7 km of melt are needed from the upwelling mantle. - To do this, the potential temperature of the source region must be about 1280ºC. - Rising melt crosses the solidus at the depth off about 45 km at 1300ºC, reaching the surface at 1200ºC. McKenzie and Bickle obtained an average melting depth of 15 km and melt fraction of 10-15%. - The magma is about 10% MgO, and the melt fraction does not exceed 24%. - Where the oceanic crust is thicker, (eg. Iceland – 27 km) higher potential temperatures are implied, upto 1480ºC.


Shallow Structure of Mid Oceanic Ridges Topography


Crustal Magma Chambers - Melted material migrates upward from the mantle to form the oceanic crust. - When cooled sufficiently from above, this melt will pond and for a liquid pool or magma chamber. - Cracking of overlying rock will open conduits (usually axis-parallel planar dikes) to feed extrusive basalt flows at the seafloor. - Whether a magma chamber is usually present beneath the seafloor is thought to be strongly dependent on spreading rate. - On the fast spreading East Pacific Rise there is extensive evidence from multichannel seismic studies for an axial magma chamber.


Crustal Magma Chambers


Thermal Models


Hydrothermal Circulation in Young Oceanic Crust


Seismic Structure EXPLORING THE EXISTENCE OF A CRUSTAL MAGMA CHAMBER !!

If present should be characterized by - Low seismic velocity - High attenuation Seismic experiments reveal: - ‘Normal’ oceanic crustal structure everywhere except over a very narrow axial zone ~ 20 km wide. - In this zone layer 3 is often absent or has reduced velocity - normal upper mantle velocities are frequently not observed - highest velocity measured is generaally 7.1-7.6 kkm/s.


Slow Spreading ridge

Fast Spreading ridge


Transform Faults


Subduction Zones


Appendix 1. Igneous Rocks In the Mantle and Crust Igneous rocks are produced by cooling of molten lava, and so are closely associated with heat transfer processes.


2. Classification of Igneous Rocks


Lecture References 1. Bott, M.H.P. (1971) The Interior of the Earth. St. Martins Press, New York. see alternatively Kennett, Figure 2-3, pg 16.2. Kennett, J.P. (1982) Marine Geology. Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey. 3. Press, F. and Siever, R. (1978) Earth (second edition). W.H. Freeman, San Francisco. 4. Isacks, B. J. Oliver and L.R. Sykes (1968) J. Geophys. Res., 73 , 588. see alternatively Kennett, Figure 5-6, pg 140. 5. Barazangi, M. and B. Isacks (1976) Geology 4, 686-692. See alternatively Kennett, Figure 5-7, pg. 141. 6. Heirtzler et al. (1966) Deep-Sea Research, 13. see alternatively Kennett, Figure 4-7, pg 119. 7. Dewey, J. (1972) "Plate Tectonics", see alternatively Kennett, Figure 5-1, pg 132. 8. Parsons, B. and J.G. Sclater (1977) An analysis of the variation of ocean floor bathymetry and heat flow with age. J. Geophys. Res. 82, 803-827. 9. Parsons, B. (1982) Causes and consequences of the relation between area and age of the ocean floor. J. Geophys. Res. 87, 289-302. 10. Carslaw, H.S. and J.C. Jaeger (1959) Conduction of Heat in Solids (2nd edition), Oxford University Press. 11. Turcotte, D.L. and G. Schubert (1982) Geodynamics: applications of continuum physics to geological problems. Wiley, New York. 12. Morse, S.A. (1980) Basalts and phase diagrams: an introduction to the quantitative use of phase diagrams in igneous petrology, Springer Verlag. 13. Turner, J.S. (1973) Buoyancy effects in fluids, Cambridge University Press. 14. Phillips, O.M. (1991) Flow and reactions in permeable rocks, Cambridge University Press. 15. Fehn, U., K.E. Green, R.P. von Herzen and L.M. Cathles (1983) A numberical model for the hydrothermal field at the Galapagos Spreading Center, J. Geophys. Res., 88, 1033-1048.


16. S.A. Morse (1980) Basalts and phase diagrams: an introduction to the quantitative use of phase diagrams in igneous petrology. Springer-Verlag, 493 pp. 17. D.R. Scott and D.J. Stevenson (1989) A self-consistent model of melting, magma migration and buoyancy-driven circulation beneath mid-ocean ridges. J. Geophys. Res., 94, 2973-2988. 18. J.P. Morgan, D.K. Blackman and J.M. Sinton (eds.) (1992) Mantle flow and melt generation at mid-ocean ridges. Geophysical Monograph 71, American Geophysical Union, Washington, 361 pp. See especially the papers: D.W. Forsyth, Geophysical constraints on mantle flow and melt generation beneath mid-ocean ridges; P.C. Hess, Phase equilibria constraints on the origin of ocean floor basalts; D.L. Turcotte and J.P. Morgan, The physics of magma migration and mantle flow beneath a mid-ocean ridge; C.H. Langmuir, E.M. Klein and T. Plank, Petrological systematics of mid-ocean ridge basalts: constraints on melt generation beneath ocean ridges 19. J.P. Morgan and Y.J. Chen (1993) The genesis of oceanic crust: magma injection, hydrothermal circulation and crustal flow. J. Geophys. Res., 98, 6283-6297. 20. W.S. Broecker and T.-H. Peng (1982) Tracers in the Sea, Eldigo Press, 690 pp. 21. R.A. Berner (1980) Early Diagenesis: A Theoretical Approach, Princeton University Press, 241 pp. 22. S. Emerson and M. Bender (1981) Carbon fluxes at the sediment-water interface of the deep-sea: calcium carbonate preservation. J. Mar. Res. 39, 139-162. 23. J.D. Hays, J. Imbrie and N.J. Shackleton (1976) Variations in the Earth's orbit: pacemaker of the ice ages. Science , 194, 1121-1132. 24. J. Imbrie, E.A. Boyle, S.C. Clemens, A. Duffy, W.R. Howard, G. Kukla, J. Kutzbach, D.G. Martinson, A. McIntyre, A.C. Mix, B. Molfino, J.J. Morley, L.C. Peterson, N.G. Pisias, W.L. Prell, M.E. Raymo, N.J. Shackleton and J.R. Toggweiler (1992) On the structure and origin of mjajor glaciation cycles. 1. Linear responses to Milankovitch forcing. Paleoceanography, 7 , 701-738. 25. J. Imbrie, A. Berger, E.A. Boyle, S.C. Clemens, A. Duffy, W.R. Howard, G. Kukla, J. Kutzbach, D.G. Martinson, A. McIntyre, A.C. Mix, B. Molfino, J.J. Morley, L.C. Peterson, N.G. Pisias, W.L. Prell, M.E. Raymo, N.J. Shackleton and J.R. Toggweiler (1993) On the structure and origin of mjajor glaciation cycles. 2. The 100,000-year cycle. Paleoceanography, 8 , 699-735.


26. N.G. Pisias and T.C. Moore Jr. (1981) The evolution of Pleistocene climate: a time series approach. Earth Planet. Sci. Letters , 52, 450-458. 27. C.R.B. Lister (19 ) 28. M.H. Ritzwoller and E.M. Lavely, Three-dimensional seismic models of the Earth's mantle, Rev. Geophys., 33, 166. 29. D.L. Anderson, Lithosphere, asthenosphere, and perisphere, Rev. Geophys., 33, 125-149. 30. A.F. Sheehan, G.A. Abers, C.H. Jones, and A.L. Lerner-Lam, Crustal thickness variations across the Colorado Rocky Mountains from teleseismic receiver functions, J. Geophys. Res., 100, 20391-20404. 31.E.A. Boyle and L.D. Keigwin (1985) Comparison of Atlantic and Pacific paleochemical records for the last 215,000 years: changes in deep ocean circulation and chemical inventories, Earth Planet. Sci. Letters, 76, 135-150. 32. T.F. Pedersen, B. Nielsen and M. Pickering (1991) Timing of late Quaternary productivity pulses in the Panama Basin and implications for atmospheric CO , Paleoceanography 6, 657-677. 33. Muller and MacDonald (1995) Nature 377, 107. See also EOS 76(48), 489-490. 34. A.R.M. Nowell, P.A. Jumars and J.E Eckman, Effects of biological activity on the entrainment of marine sediments, Marine Geology, 42, 133-153. 35. I.N. McCave (1984) Size spectra and aggregation of suspended praticles in the deep ocean. Deep-Sea Res., 31, 329-352. 36. I.N. McCave (1983) Particle size spectra, behavior, and origin of nepheloid lyaers over the Nova Scotian continental rise. J. Geophys. Res, 88, 7647-7666. 37. W. Stumm and J.J. Morgan (1970) Aquatic chemistry, 1st ed., Wiley. 38.P.A. Jumars and A.R.M. Nowell (1984) Effects of benthos on sediment transport: difficulties with functional grouping. Cont. Shelf. Res., 3, 115-130. 39. J.E. Eckman and A.R.M. Nowell (1984) Boundary skin friction and sediment transport about an animal-tube mimic. Sedimentology, 31, 851-862.


40. T.F. Gross and A.J. Williams III (1991) Characterization of deep-sea storms, Mar. Geol. 99, 281-301. 41. W.J. Kious and R.I. Tilling, This Dynamic Earth: The Story of Plate Tectonics, U.S. Geological Survey, 1996. (on-line edition available.) 42. P. Kumar and E. Foufoula-Georgiou (1997) Wavelet analysis for geophysical applications. Rev. Geophys., 35, 385-412. 43. C.A. Stein and S. Stein (1992) A model for the global variation in oceanic depth and heat flow with lithospheric age. Nature, 359, 123-129. 44. T.N. Narasimhan (1999) Fourier's heat conduction equation: history, influence, and connections. Rev. Geophys., 37, 151-172. 45. K.G. Speer and P.A. Rona (1989) A model of an Atlantic and Pacific hydrothermal plume. J. Geophys. Res. 94, 6213-20. 46. W.R. Peltier (1998) Postglacial variations in the level of the sea: Implications for climate dynamics and solidearth geophysics, Reviews of Geophysics 36, 603-689.


Turn static files into dynamic content formats.

Create a flipbook
Issuu converts static files into: digital portfolios, online yearbooks, online catalogs, digital photo albums and more. Sign up and create your flipbook.