Semiquantitative mineral analysis has been done by X-ray diffraction on the < 2 μ- and 2–20 μ-size fractions of approximately five hundred Recent deep-sea core samples from the Atlantic, Antarctic, western Indian Oceans, and adjacent seas. Relative abundances of montmorillonite, illite, kaolinite, chlorite, gibbsite, quartz, amphibole, clinoptilolite-heulandite(?), and pyrophyllite(?) were determined. Mixed-layer clay minerals, feldspars, and dolomite were also observed but not quantitatively evaluated. From the patterns of mineral distribution, the following conclusions appear warranted:

Most Recent Atlantic Ocean deep-sea clay is detritus from the continents. The formation of minerals in situ on the ocean bottom is relatively unimportant in the Atlantic but may be significant in parts of the southwestern Indian Ocean.

Mineralogical analysis of the fine fraction of Atlantic Ocean deep-sea sediments is a useful indicator of sediment provenance. Kaolinite, gibbsite, pyrophyllite, mixed-layer minerals, and chlorite contribute the most unequivocal provenance information because they have relatively restricted loci of continental origin.

Topographic control over mineral distribution by the Mid-Atlantic Ridge in the North Atlantic Ocean precludes significant eolian transport by the jet stream and emphasizes the importance of transport to and within that part of the deep-sea by processes operative at or near the sediment-water interface.

Transport of continent-derived sediment to the equatorial Atlantic is primarily by rivers draining from South America and by rivers and wind from Africa.

The higher proportion of kaolinite and gibbsite in deep-sea sediments adjacent to small tropical South American rivers reflects a greater intensity of lateritic weathering than is observed near the mouths of the larger rivers. This may be explained by a greater variety of pedogenic conditions in the larger drainage basins, resulting in an assemblage with proportionately less lateritic material in the detritus transported by the larger rivers despite their quantitatively greater influence on deep-sea sediment accumulation.

In the South Atlantic Ocean, the fine-fraction mineral assemblage of surface sediment in the Argentine Basin is sufficiently unlike that adjacent to the mouth of the Rio de la Plata to preclude it as a major Recent sediment source for that basin. The southern Argentine Continental Shelf, the Scotia Ridge, and the Weddell Sea arc mineralogically more likely immediate sources. Transport from the Weddell Sea by the Antarctic Bottom Water may be responsible for the northward transport of fine-fraction sediment along parts of the western South Atlantic as far north as the Equator.

Mineralogy and Sedimentation of Recent Deep-Sea Clay in the Atlantic Ocean and Adjacent Seas and Oceans

Granites and related volcanic rocks of the Lachlan Fold Belt can be grouped into suites using chemical and petrographic data. The distinctive characteristics of suites reflect source-rock features. The first-order subdivision within the suites is between those derived from igneous and from sedimentary source rocks, the I- and S-types. Differences between the two types of source rocks and their derived granites are due to the sedimentary source material having been previously weathered at the Earth's surface. Chemically, the S-type granites are lower in Na, Ca, Sr and Fe3+/Fe2+, and higher in Cr and Ni. As a consequence, the S-types are always peraluminous and contain Al-rich minerals. A little over 50% of the I-type granites are metaluminous and these more mafic rocks contain hornblende. In the absence of associated mafic rocks, the more felsic and slightly peraluminous I-type granites may be difficult to distinguish from felsic S-type granites. This overlap in composition is to be expected and results from the restricted chemical composition of the lowest temperature felsic melts. The compositions of more mafic I- and S-type granites diverge, as a result of the incorporation of more mafic components from the source, either as restite or a component of higher temperature melt. There is no overlap in composition between the most mafic I- and S-type granites, whose compositions are closest to those of their respective source rocks. Likewise, the enclaves present in the more mafic granites have compositions reflecting those of their host rocks, and probably in most cases, the source rocks.S-type granites have higher δ18O values and more evolved Sr and Nd isotopic compositions, although the radiogenic isotope compositions overlap with I-types. Although the isotopic compositions lie close to a mixing curve, it is thought that the amount of mixing in the source rocks was restricted, and occurred prior to partial melting. I-type granites are thought to have been derived from deep crust formed by underplating and thus are infracrustal, in contrast to the supracrustal S-type source rocks.Crystallisation of feldspars from felsic granite melts leads to distinctive changes in the trace element compositions of more evolved I- and S-type granites. Most notably, P increases in abundance with fractionation of crystals from the more strongly peraluminous S-type felsic melts, while it decreases in abundance in the analogous, but weakly peraluminous, I-type melts.

https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/S0263593300007720

I- and S-type granites in the Lachlan Fold Belt

Every large eruption of nonbasaltic magma taps a magma reservoir that is thermally and compositionally zoned. Most small eruptions also tap parts of heterogeneous and evolving magmatic systems. Several kinds of compositionally zoned ash flow tuffs provide examples of preemptive gradients in T and ƒO2, in chemical and isotopic composition, and in the variety, abundance, and composition of phenocrysts. Such gradients help to constrain the mechanisms of magmatic differentiation operating in each system. Roofward decreases in both T and phenocryst content suggest water concentration gradients in magma chambers. Wide compositional gaps are common features of large eruptions, proving the existence of such gaps in a variety of magmatic systems. Nearly all magmatic systems are ‘fundamentally basaltic’ in the sense that mantle-derived magmas supply heat and mass to crustal systems that evolve a variety of compositional ranges. Feedback between crustal melting and interception of basaltic intrusions focuses and amplifies magmatic anomalies, suppresses basaltic volcanism, produces and sustains crustal magma chambers, and sometimes culminates in large-scale diapirism. Degassing of basalt crystallizing in the roots of these systems provides a flux of He, CO2, S, halogens, and other components, some of which may influence chemical transport in the overlying, more silicic zones. Basaltic magmas become andesitic by concurrent fractionation and assimilation of partial melts over a large depth range during protracted upward percolation in a plexus of crustal conduits. Zonation in the andesitic-dacitic compositional range develops subsequently within magma chambers, primarily by crystal fractionation. Some dacitic and rhyolitic liquids may separate from less-silicic parents by means of ascending boundary layers along the walls of convecting magma chambers. Many rhyolites, however, are direct partial melts of crustal rocks, and still others fractionate from crystal-rich intermediate parents. The zoning of rhyolitic magma is accomplished predominantly by liquid state thermodiffusion and volatile complexing; liquid structural gradients may be important, and thermal gradients across magma chamber boundary layers are critical. Intracontinental silicic batholiths form where extensional tectonism favors coalescence of crustal partial melts instead of hybridization with the intrusive basaltic magma. Cordilleran batholiths, however, result from prolonged diffuse injection of the crust by basalt that hybridizes, fractionates, and preheats the crust with pervasive mafic to intermediate forerunners, culminating in large-scale diapiric mobilization of partially molten zones from which granodioritic magmas separate. Much of the variability among magmatic systems probably reflects the depth variation of relative rates of transport of magma, heat, and volatile components, as controlled in turn by the orientation and relative magnitudes of principal stresses in the lithosphere, the thickness and composition of the affected crust, and variations in the rate and longevity of basaltic magma supply. Extension of the lithosphere may reduce the susceptibility of basaltic magmas to hybridization in the crust, but it can also enhance the role of mantle-derived volatiles in chemical transport.

Gradients in silicic magma chambers: Implications for lithospheric magmatism

Mantle plumes from ancient oceanic crust

[1] Millennial climate oscillations of the glacial interval are interrupted by extreme events, the so-called Heinrich events of the North Atlantic. Their near-global footprint is a testament to coherent interactions among Earth's atmosphere, oceans, and cryosphere on millennial timescales. Heinrich detritus appears to have been derived from the region around Hudson Strait. It was deposited over approximately 500 ± 250 years. Several mechanisms have been proposed for the origin of the layers: binge-purge cycle of the Laurentide ice sheet, jokulhlaup activity from a Hudson Bay lake, and an ice shelf buildup/collapse fed by Hudson Strait. To determine the origin of the Heinrich events, I recommend (1) further studies of the timing and duration of the events, (2) further sedimentology study near the Hudson Strait, and (3) greater spatial and temporal resolution studies of the layers as well as their precursory intervals. Studies of previous glacial intervals may also provide important constraints.

Heinrich events: Massive late Pleistocene detritus layers of the North Atlantic and their global climate imprint

Rubidium and strontium are used as tracers in the history of differentiation of the continental sial, and for this purpose it is assumed that the Rb/Sr ratio follows the aggregate enrichment of sialic components sufficiently well to represent an approximately linear measure of the entire process. Measurements of the Sr87/Sr86 ratios in basalts and other igneous rocks of subsialic origin suggest that the source regions of sial have had a Sr87/Sr86 ratio in the range 0.705 to 0.710 in different areas and at different times in the span of geologic history. Measurements of the Rb/Sr ratio in sialic rocks of the continental crystalline basement have indicated that the weighted average value for this ratio is in the vicinity of 0.25. This means that the Sr87/Sr86 ratio in average sialic rocks of the continental basement would increase at a faster rate than that in the subsialic source regions, by an amount equal to approximately 0.010 per billion years. This is more than five times the standard deviation precision error in measurement. A comparison of the ratio Sr87/Sr86 with the geologic age of the rock, in samples of typical sialic basement rocks leads to the conclusion that there has been a continuous generation of primary sial from subsialic source regions that has caused the continental areas to grow roughly in proportion to the extent of the geological age provinces. In North America this areal growth is estimated to be at the average rate of about 7000 km2/m.y., and it seems to have been operative over most of geologic time.

A model is formulated in which the proportion and age of reworked material that is incorporated into new sialic basement are related to the Sr87/Sr86 development in the various materials involved. The model is generalized with all the parameters left open. An example set of values for the various parameters is tested on the model to indicate where there is need for more definitive data. This example set is derived from data available at present which, although very limited, indicate clearly that if the reworked material is young enough it can constitute a major proportion of a new sialic basement area, but if it is ancient (1 to 2 b.y. in primary age prior to incorporation) it could not be present in more than a minor proportion of the typical new basement.

Radiogenic strontium-87 model of continent formation

The dependence of K-Ar age on the mineralogy of various particle size ranges in a shale

Age of Bosumtwi crater area, Ghana, determined by mass spectrometry of rubidium, strontium and strontium isotopic composition, compared to Ivory Coast tektite age

https://science.sciencemag.org/content/sci/151/3712/817.full.pdf

W. H. Pinson

Papers

Radiogenic strontium-87 model of continent formation

The dependence of K-Ar age on the mineralogy of various particle size ranges in a shale

Rubidium-strontium age of the bosumtwi crater area, ghana, compared with the age of the ivory coast tektites.

Ancient age of the Middle Marker Horizon, Onverwacht Group, Swaziland Sequence, South Africa

Radiogenic argon and strontium diffusion parameters in biotite at low temperatures obtained from alpine fault uplift in new zealand