Melting under the Colorado Plateau, USA - INSU - Institut national des sciences de l'Univers Access content directly
Journal Articles Geology Year : 2012

Melting under the Colorado Plateau, USA

Abstract

Mafic volcanism gradually encroaching on the tectonically stable Colorado Plateau in the southwestern United States appears to originate from within Paleoproterozoic lithosphere. New Hf and Nd isotope data strengthen evidence for magma source heterogeneity; other geochemical signatures show these sources to consist dominantly of peridotite. Tomographic and receiver function analyses reveal that young volcanism occurs above or outboard of a pronounced shallowing in the lithosphere-asthenosphere boundary. Melt extraction extends to the base of lithosphere thinned to <75 km, with more shallowly derived melts characterized by higher degrees of partial melting. Accordingly, decompression melting of a reactivated chemical boundary layer +/- asthenosphere, rather than in situ lithospheric melting or melting of lithospheric mantle drips/delaminations, appears to be responsible for recent Colorado Plateau magma generation
Not file

Dates and versions

insu-00704820 , version 1 (06-06-2012)

Identifiers

Cite

Mary R. Reid, Romain A. Bouchet, Janne Blichert-Toft, Alan Levander, Kaijian Liu, et al.. Melting under the Colorado Plateau, USA. Geology, 2012, 40 (5), pp.387-390. ⟨10.1130/G32619.1⟩. ⟨insu-00704820⟩
27 View
0 Download

Altmetric

Share

Gmail Facebook Twitter LinkedIn More