oxygen isotope studies of achondrites abstract oxygen isotope abundances provide a powerful tool for recognizing genetic relationships among meteorites among the differentiated achondrites three isotopic groups are recognized l snc mars 2 earth and moon and 3 hed howardites eucrites diogenites the hed group also contains the mesosiderites main group pallasites and silicates from iiiab irons the angrites may be marginally resolvable from the hed group within each of these groups internal geologic processes give rise to isotopic variations along a slope 1 2 fractionation line as is well known for terrestrial materials variations of 17o from one planet to another are inherited from the inhomogeneities in the solar nebula as illustrated by the isotopic compositions of chondrites and their constituents among the undifferentiated achondrites five isotopic groups are found 1 aubrites 2 winonaites and iab iiicd irons 3 brachinites 4 acapulcoites and lodranites and 5 ureilites the isotopic compositions of aubrites coincide with the earth and moon and also with the enstatite chondrites these bodies apparently were derived from a common reservoir the isotopic composition of which was established at the chondrule scale by nebular processes isotopic similarities between chondrites and achondrites are seen only for the following instances 1 enstatite chondrites and aubrites 2 h chondrites and he irons and 3 l or ll chondrites and iva irons the isotopic data also support the following genetic associations 1 winonaites and iab iiicd irons 2 acapulcoites and lodranites and 3 ureilites and dark inclusions of c3 chondrites an attempt to reconcile the whole planet isotopic compositions of earth mars and the eucrite parent body with mixing models of their chemical compositions failed it is not possible to satisfy both the chemical and isotopic compositions of the terrestrial planets using known primitive solar system components

thermodynamic constraints on the formation conditions of winonaites and silicate bearing iab irons abstract silicate inclusions in iab irons and related winonaite meteorites have textures mineralogies and mineral chemistries that indicate a complex formation history of heating followed by brecciation and metamorphism using olivine orthopyroxene chromite assemblages in five iab iron silicate inclusions caddo county campo del cielo copiapo lueders and udei station and one winonaite winona we calculated closure temperatures and oxygen fugacities for these meteorites calculated olivine chromite fe mg exchange temperatures are compared to two pyroxene temperatures olivine chromite closure temperatures range from 590 c to 700 c while two pyroxene temperatures range from 900 c to 1200 c oxygen fugacities of these meteorites determined for the first time in this study range from 2 3 to 3 2 log units below the fe feo buffer and define a line between the fe feo and cr cr 2 o 3 buffers highly variable temperatures were experienced by these rocks on the hand sample and sometimes even the thin section scale consistent with the idea that the winonaite iab iron parent body experienced collisional fragmentation and reassembly after peak temperatures were reached although modest reduction likely occurred during cooling the oxygen fugacities and mineral compositions recorded at peak metamorphic temperatures suggest that the chondritic precursor for this parent body was initially more reduced than ordinary chondrites

explosive volcanism and the compositions of cores of differentiated asteroids eleven iron meteorite groups show correlations between ni and siderophile trace elements that are predictable by distribution coefficients between liquid and solid metal in fractionally crystallizing metal magmas these meteorites are interpreted to be fragments of the fractionally crystallized cores of eleven differentiated asteroids many of these groups crystallized from s depleted magmas which we propose resulted from removal of the first partial melt the fe nifes cotectic melt by explosive pyroclastic volcanism of the type envisaged by wilson and keil 8 we show that these dense negatively buoyant melts can be driven to asteroidal surfaces due to the presence of excess pressure in the melt and the presence of buoyant bubbles of gas which decrease the density of the melt we also show that in typical asteroidal materials veins will form which grow into dikes and serve as pathways for migration of melt and gas to asteroidal surfaces since cotectic fe nifes melt consists of about 85 wt fes and 15 wt fe ni removal of small volumes of eutectic melts results in major loss of s but only minor loss of fe ni thus leaving sufficient fe ni to form sizeable asteroidal cores

rare earth element geochemistry and petrogenesis of miles iie silicate inclusions an ion probe study of rare earth element ree geochemistry of silicate inclusions in the miles he iron meteorite was carried out individual mineral phases among inclusions have distinct ree patterns and abundances most silicate grains have homogeneous ree abundances but show considerable intergrain variations between inclusions a few pyroxene grains display normal igneous ree zoning phosphates whitlockite and apatite are highly enriched in rees 50 to 2000 x ci with a relatively light rare earth element lree enriched ree pattern they usually occurred near the interfaces between inclusions and fe host in miles albitic glasses exhibit two distinctive ree patterns a highly fractionated lree enriched ci normalized la sm similar to 15 pattern with a large positive eu anomaly and a relatively heavy rare earth element hree enriched pattern ci normalized lu gd similar to4 with a positive eu anomaly and a negative yb anomaly the glass is generally depleted in rees relative to ci chondrites

the perils of partition difficulties in retrieving magma compositions from chemically equilibrated basaltic meteorites abstract the chemical compositions of magmas can be derived from the compositions of their equilibrium minerals through mineral magma partition coefficients this method cannot be applied safely to basaltic rocks either solidified lavas or cumulates which have chemically equilibrated or partially equilibrated at subsolidus temperatures i e in the absence of magma applying mineral melt partition coefficients to mineral compositions from such rocks will typically yield magma compositions that are strongly fractionated and unreasonably enriched in incompatible elements e g rees in the absence of magma incompatible elements must go somewhere they are forced into minerals e g pyroxenes plagioclase at abundance levels far beyond those established during normal mineral magma equilibria further using mineral magma partition coefficients with such rocks may suggest that different minerals equilibrated with different magmas and the fractionation sequence of those melts i e enrichment in incompatible elements may not be consistent with independent constraints on the order of crystallization subsolidus equilibration is a reasonable cause for incompatibleelement enriched minerals in some eucrites diogenites and martian meteorites and offers a simple alternative to petrogenetic schemes involving highly fractionated magmas or magma infiltration metasomatism

the origin and nebular history of the metal phase of ordinary chondrites abstract we present new inaa results for bulk metal from h and ll chondrites both have characteristic elemental patterns similar to l chondrite metal in particular increasing abundances of w and ga from unequilibrated to equilibrated chondrites but a reverse variation of v and cr abundances these characteristics indicate that metal in ordinary chondrites formed by melting and reduction of highly oxidized material the similarities of melting features and the complementary nature of compositions between metal and chondrules suggest that these two components were derived from a common precursor similar to ci or cm material in redox state and compositionally related to the matrix of highly unequilibrated ordinary chondrites co ni abundance ratios are similarly low for bulk metal in the least metamorphosed ordinary chondrites of all three chemical groups this suggests that metal in ordinary chondrites initially had the same composition and formed under the same melting conditions the chondrites that accreted earliest have preserved their melting characteristics while those that accreted later reequilibrated with the ambient gas at different temperatures the differences in redox state between equilibrated and unequilibrated chondrites show that formation of chondritic metal and chondrules by melting occurred during the accretion of ordinary chondrite parent bodies the initial metal composition established during the melting stage 13 wt ni co ni 0 031 is inferred from the metal in highly unequilibrated chondrites the accretion temperatures of about 600 k for ordinary chondrites are calculated from the reequilibration reaction h chondrites were accreted at the highest temperature and are most reduced among the three ordinary chondrite groups ll chondrites were accreted at the lowest temperature and are most oxidized compositionally the metal component that would account for the fe si fractionation among h l and ll chondrites is different from the metal formed by melting indicating that the different fe s ratios of h l and ll chondrites were established before their accretion

40ar 39ar dating of plagioclase grain size separates from silicate inclusions in iab iron meteorites and implications for the thermochronological evolution of the iab parent body abstract in order to better constrain the thermochronological evolution of the iab parent body we performed a 40ar 39ar age study on individual silicate inclusions of the iab irons caddo county campo del cielo landes and ocotillo in contrast to earlier studies several plagioclase separates of different grain sizes and quality grades were extracted from each inclusion to reduce the complexity of the age spectra and study the influence of these parameters on the ar ar ages in nearly all inclusions we found significantly different ar ar ages among the separates caddo county 4 472 0 02 4 562 0 02 ga campo del cielo 2 4 362 0 04 4 442 0 03 ga landes 2 4 412 0 05 4 522 0 04 ga ocotillo 4 382 0 04 4 462 0 03 ga these ages were calculated using the new 40k decay constant published by mundil r renne p r min k and ludwig k r 2006 resolvable miscalibration of the 40ar 39ar geochronometer eos trans agu 87 fall meet suppl abstract v21a 0543 the ages did not systematically correlate with the respective grain size of the separate as expected i e smaller grains did not necessarily show younger ages due to later closure to ar diffusion or easier re opening of the system in the course of a reheating event compared to larger grains based on the large range of ar ar ages we suggest that the individual inclusions are composed of silicate grains from different locations within the iab parent body while some grains remained in a hot deep environment that allowed ar diffusion over an extended time period in some cases combined with grain coarsening others cooled significantly earlier near surface through the k ar blocking temperature these different grains where brought together during an impact followed by mixing and reassembly of the debris as proposed by benedix et al benedix g k mccoy t j keil k and love s g 2000 a petrologic study of the iab iron meteorites constraints on the formation of the iab winonaite parent body meteorit planet sci 35 1127 1141 due to rapid cooling after the impact some of the age differences among the grains could be preserved based mainly on our caddo county ar ar age information the iab parent body was destroyed by impact and reassembled between 4 5 and 4 47 ga however iab silicate ar ar ages should depend much more on the pre and post impact cooling rate and burial depth than on the time of the actual impact this is supported by a compilation of our and literature iab and winonaite ar ar ages ranging smoothly from the time of accretion of the chondritic iab parent body down to the time of its final cooling through the k ar blocking temperature after impact and reassembly instead of showing a peak in ar ar ages at the time of the destructive impact

chronology and petrology of silicates from iie iron meteorites evidence of a complex parent body evolution iie iron meteorites contain silicate inclusions the characteristics of which suggest a parent body similar to that of h chondrites however these silicates show a wide range of alteration ranging from netschaevo and techado the inclusions of which are little altered to highly differentiated silicates like those in kodaikanal weekeroo station and colomera which have lost metal and sulfur and are enriched in feldspar we find these inclusions to show varying degrees of shock alteration we made 39ar 40ar age determinations of watson techado miles colomera and sombrerete watson has an ar ar age of 3 677 0 007 gyr similar to previously reported ages for kodaikanal and netschaevo we suggest that the various determined radiometric ages of these three meteorites were probably reset by a common impact event the space exposure ages for these three meteorites are also similar to each other and are considerably younger than exposure ages of other iies 39ar 40ar ages inferred for the other four meteorites analyzed are considerably older than watson and are techado 4 49 0 01 gyr miles 4 405 0 012 gyr colomera 4 470 0 010 gyr and sombrerete 4 541 0 0012 gyr these ages are in fair agreement with previously reported rb sr isochron ages for colomera and weekeroo station although several mechanisms to form iie meteorites have been suggested it is not obvious that a single mechanism could produce a suite of meteorites with very different degrees of silicate differentiation and with isotopic ages that differ by 0 8 gyr we suggest that those iies with older isotopic ages are a product of partial melting and differentiation within the parent body followed by mixing of silicate and metal while both were relatively hot netschaevo and watson may have formed by this same process or by impact mixing 4 5 gyr ago but their isotopic ages may have been subsequently reset by shock heating kodaikanal apparently is required to have formed more recently in which case impact melting and differentiation seems the only viable process we see no compelling reasons to believe that iie silicate and metal derived from different parent bodies or that the parent body of iies was the same as that of h chondrites

partitioning of moderately siderophile elements among olivine silicate melt and sulfide melt constraints on core formation in the earth and mars abstract this study investigates the effects of variations in the fugacities of oxygen and sulfur on the partitioning of first series transition metals v cr mn fe co ni and cu and w among coexisting sulfide melt silicate melt and olivine experiments were performed at 1 atm pressure 1350 c with the fugacities of oxygen and sulfur controlled by mixing co2 co and so2 gases starting compositions consisted of a cao mgo al2o3 sio2 feo na2o analog for a barred olivine chondrule from an ordinary chondrite and a synthetic komatiite the f o 2 f s 2 conditions ranged from log f o 2 7 9 to 10 6 wi log f s 2 values ranging from 1 0 to 2 5 our experimental results demonstrate that the f o 2 f s 2 dependencies of sulfide melt silicate melt partition coefficients for the first series transition metals are proportional to their valence states the f o 2 f s 2 dependencies for the partitioning of fe co ni and cu are weaker than predicted on the basis of their valence states variations in f o 2 f s 2 conditions have no significant effect on olivine melt partitioning other than those resulting from f o 2 induced changes in the valence state of a given element the strong f o 2 f s 2 dependence for the olivine silicate melt partitioning of v is attributable to a change of valence state from 4 to 3 with decreasing f o 2 our experimentally determined partition coefficients are used to develop models for the segregation of sulfide and metal from the silicate portion of the early earth and the shergottite parent body mars we find that the influence of s is not sufficient to explain the overabundance of siderophile and chalcophile elements that remained in the mantle of the earth following core formation important constraints on core formation in mars are provided by our experimental determination of the partitioning of cu between silicate and sulfide melts when combined with existing estimates for siderophile element abundances in the martian mantle and a mass balance constraint from fe the experiments allow a determination of the mass of the martian core 17 to 22 wt of the planet and its s content 0 4 wt these modeling results indicate that mars is depleted in s and that its core is solid

a comparison of metallographic cooling rate methods used in meteorites abstract the primary objective of this study was to test the postulate that cooling rates acquired from metal grains in chondrites are consistent with those from iron meteorites both types of metal occur in some group iab meteorites which are mixtures of massive metal with well developed widmanstatten structures and chondritic inclusions with dispersed metal grains the grains have textures and compositions similar to chondritic metal including negligible p the meteorites studied show little or no sign of shock reheating and textural evidence indicates that silicates and metal were mixed before widmanstatten patterns formed during cooling cooling rates were obtained by comparing measured to modeled taenite grain or lamellae dimensions and central ni contents modeling entails solving diffusion equations using experimental diffusion coefficients phase relations and bulk or local ni and p contents taking into account geometry undercooling and impingement there is one set of parameters for grains and another quite different set for widmanstatten lamellae including a factor of 30 difference in diffusion coefficients yet cooling rates obtained from widmanstatten structures and metal grains in chondritic inclusions of the same meteorite are consistent uncertainties in the best data are 10 ma equivalent to a factor of 1 0 25 this agreement implies that the data and models are correct or contain fortuitously offsetting errors which is quite unlikely cooling rates range from 40 ma to 70 ma in iab meteorites that contain both grains and widmanstatten structures rates based on grains in ni poor and ni rich meteorites lacking widmanstatten patterns expand the range from 30 ma to perhaps 200 ma cooling rates correlate with ni content ni poor meteorites have slower rates than ni rich ones evidently iab meteorites were radially distributed over 30km in a body with a radius 50km a comparison of the available ar ages with cooling times inferred from the cooling rates suggests that the parent body cooled more slowly after the metallographic cooling rates were established

mineralogy of silicate inclusions of the colomera iie iron and crystallization of cr diopside and alkali feldspar from a partial melt we studied the mineralogy mineral chemistry and compositions of 48 interior silicate inclusions and a large k rich surface inclusion from the colomera he iron meteorite common minerals in the interior silicate inclusions are cr diopside and na plagioclase albite they are often enclosed by or coexist with albitic glasses with excess silica and minor fe mg components this mineral assemblage is similar to the andesitic material found in the caddo county iab iron meteorite for which a partial melt origin has been proposed the fairly uniform compositions of cr diopside ca44mg46fe10 and na plagioclase or 2 5 ab 90 0 an 7 5 to or 3 5 ab 96 1 an 0 4 in colomera interior inclusions and the angular boundaries between minerals and metal suggest that diopside and plagioclase partially crystallized under near equilibrium conditions from a common melt before emplacement into molten metal the melt crystal assemblage has been called crystal mush the bulk compositions of the individual composite inclusions form an array between the most diopside rich inclusion and plagioclase this is consistent only with a simple mechanical mixing relationship not a magmatic evolution series we propose a model in which partly molten metal and crystal mush were mixed together by impact on the he parent body other models involving impact melting of the chondritic source material followed by growth of diopside and plagioclase do not easily explain near equilibrium growth of diopside and na plagioclase followed by rapid cooling in the k rich surface inclusion k feldspar orthopyroxene and olivine were found together with diopside for the first time k feldspar sanidine or 92 7 ab 7 2 an 0 1 to or 87 3 ab 11 0 an 1 7 occurs in an irregular veinlike region in contact with large orthopyroxene crystals of nearly uniform composition ca1 3mg80 5fe17 8 to ca3 1mg78 1fe18 9 and intruding into a relict olivine with deformed oval shape silica and subrounded cr diopside are present within such k feldspar regions some enrichments of the albite component have been detected at the end of curved elongated nodules of k feldspar intruded into the mafic silicates the textural relationships suggest that a k rich melt was present a k rich melt is neither the first melt of a chondritic system nor a differentiation product of a na rich partial melt of chondritic material the k rich material may have originated as a fluid phase that leached k from surrounding materials and segregated by a mechanism similar to that proposed for the na rich inclusions copyright c 2003 elsevier science ltd

the behavior of actinides phosphorus and rare earth elements during chondrite metamorphism new data on the u pu and p distributions in less metamorphosed h chondrites type 3 5 coupled with literature results permit a provisional picture to be assembled of the chemistry of these elements and for the rare earth elements in ordinary chondrites and the changes brought about by chondritic metamorphism preferential associations of phosphates with metals and or sulndes in all chondrites strongly indicate an initially siderophile or conceivably chalcophile character for p in ordinary chondrite precursor materials with phosphate subsequently formed by oxidation this oxidation occurred prior to or during chondritic metal silicate fractionation uranium is initially concentrated in chondrule glass at 100 ppb levels with phosphates primarily merrillite in h 3 chondrites being essentially u free 20 ppb as chondrule glass devitrified during metamorphism u migrated into phosphates reaching 50 ppb in nadiabondi h 5 merrillite and 200 300 ppb in merrillite from equilibrated chondrites but froze out before total concentration in phosphates occurred relative 244 pu fission track densities in the outer 5 m of olivine and pyroxene grains in contact with merrillite and with chondrule mesostasis in bremervorde h 3 give pu mesostasis pu merrillite 0 01 implying total concentration of pu in phosphates similarly no detectable pu 0 1 ppb was found in chondrule mesostasis in tieschitz and sharps whereas direct measurements of tracks in phosphates in h 3 chondrites are consistent with high 10 ppb pu concentrations thus a strong pu p correlation is indicated for ordinary chondrites there is variable pu u fractionation in all chondritic phosphates reaching an extreme degree in the unequilibrated chondrites therefore the pu u ratio in phosphates appears relatively useless for relative meteorite chronology literature data indicate that the ree are located in chondrules in unequilibrated chondrites most likely in glass thus there may also be strong pu nd fractionation within these meteorites like u the ree migrate into phosphates during metamorphism but unlike u appear to be quantitatively concentrated in phosphates in equilibrated chondrites thus relative ages based on pu nd may be possible for equilibrated chondrites but the same chronological conclusions are probably obtainable from pu concentrations in phosphates i e on the pu p ratio however pu p chronology is possible only for ordinary chondrites so there appears to be no universal reference element to cancel the effects of pu chemical fractionation in all meteorites available data are consistent with but certainly do not prove that variations in pu p represent age differences but if these age differences do not exist then it is conceivable that the solar system 244 pu 238 u ratio important for cosmochronology is still lower than the presently accepted value of 0 007

petrogenesis of silicate inclusions in the weekeroo station iie iron meteorite differentiation remelting and dynamic mixing the weekeroo station iie iron meteorite contains a variety of felsic and mafic inclusions enclosed in an feni metal host petrographic emp and sims data suggest that the petrogenesis of the silicates was complex and included differentiation remelting feo reduction and dynamic mixing of phases differentiation produced a variety of olivine free inclusion assemblages ranging from pyroxene 1 plagioclase 1 tridymite with peritectic compositions to coarse orthopyroxene to plagioclase 1 tridymite and its glassy equivalent individual phases have similar trace element abundances and patterns despite large variations in inclusion textures modes and bulk compositions probably as a result of mechanical separation of pre existing phases in an impact event that dynamically mixed silicates with the metallic host trace element data imply that augite and plagioclase grains in different inclusions crystallized from the same precursor melt characterized by relatively unfractionated ree abundances of 20 30 3 ci chondrites except for a negative eu anomaly such a precursor melt could have been produced by 2 5 equilibrium partial melting of an h chondrite silicate protolith or by higher degrees of partial melting involving subsequent fractional crystallization glass appears to have formed by the remelting of pre existing plagio clase and orthopyroxene in a process that involved either disequilibrium or substantial melting of these phases during remelting silicate melt reacted with the feni metal host and feo was reduced to fe metal following remelting and metal silicate mixing inclusions apparently cooled at different rates in a near surface setting on the parent body glass or pigeonite bearing inclusions cooled more rapidly 2 5 c hr between 1000 850 c than pigeonite free largely crystalline inclusions the results of this study point to two likely models for forming iie iron meteorites both involving collision between an feni metal impactor and either a differentiated or undifferentiated silicate rich target of h chondrite affinity each model has difficulties and it is possible that both are required to explain the diverse iie group copyright 1999 elsevier science ltd

a petrologic study of the iab iron meteorites constraints on the formation of the iab winonaite parent body abstract we have studied iab iron meteorites and their silicate bearing inclusions to elucidate the origin of their parent body we have divided iab irons into five categories which best describe the inclusions and other properties of the irons these are 1 sulfide rich irons such as mundrabilla that contain a significant volume fraction of troilite with or without associated silicates 2 irons with non chondritic silicate inclusions such as basaltic inclusions in caddo county 3 irons with rounded troilite and or graphite inclusions sometimes containing embedded angular silicate inclusions 4 irons with angular silicate inclusions similar to those of the winonaites where silicates may comprise up to 40 vol of the rock and 5 irons with phosphate bearing inclusions such as the brianite bearing iab san cristobal similarities in mineralogy mineral and oxygen isotopic compositions suggest that iab irons and winonaites are almost certainly from a common parent body iiicd irons may also have originated on this parent body although evidence supporting this suggestion is less convincing previous models for the origin of iab irons propose that they are either products of selective impact melting in the megaregoliths of a chondritic asteroid or products of partial melting and fractional crystallization during formation of a sulfur rich core the former model suffers from the fact that impact is incapable of causing preferential melting of metal and sulfide on a large scale and pooling of these selective melts into sizable bodies the latter model does not readily explain the occurrence of often fragmentary angular silicate clasts in a metallic fe ni host we propose a new model for the origin of iab irons that incorporates aspects of both previous models we suggest that a chondritic possibly heterogeneous parent body was heated by a non collisional heat source which caused partial but not complete melting of the body after peak temperatures were reached and cooling and crystallization had begun a major impact catastrophically fragmented this body and the debris gravitationally reassembled scrambling the parent body lithologies we suggest that the impact caused extensive mixing of molten metallic fe ni and solid silicate material resulting in the formation of iab irons with silicate inclusions whereas winonaites represent metamorphosed rocks and partial melt residues of the precursor silicate lithologies high temperatures of some of the reassembled debris and deep burial resulted in continued fractionation and formation of the 2

differentiation and evolution of the iva meteorite parent body clues from pyroxene geochemistry in the steinbach stony iron meteorite we analyzed the steinbach iva stony iron meteorite using scanning electron microscopy sem electron microprobe analysis empa laser ablation inductively coupled plasma mass spectroscopy la icp ms and modeling techniques different and sometimes adjacent low ca pyroxene grains have distinct compositions and evidently crystallized at different stages in a chemically evolving system prior to the solidification of metal and troilite early crystallizing pyroxene shows evidence for disequilibrium and formation under conditions of rapid cooling producing clinobronzite and type 1 pyroxene rich in troilite and other inclusions subsequently type 2 pyroxene crystallized over an extensive fractionation interval steinbach probably formed as a cumulate produced by extensive crystal fractionation 6070 fractional crystallization from a high temperature 1450 1490 c silicate metallic magma the inferred composition of the precursor magma is best modeled as having formed by 30 50 silicate partial melting of a chondritic protolith if this protolith was similar to an ll chondrite as implied by o isotopic data then olivine must have separated from the partial melt and a substantial amount 53 56 of feo must have been reduced in the silicate magma a model of simultaneous endogenic heating and collisional disruption appears best able to explain the data for steinbach and other iva meteorites impact disruption occurred while the parent body was substantially molten causing liquids to separate from solids and oxygen bearing gas to vent to space leading to a molten metal rich body that was smaller than the original parent body and that solidified from the outside in this model can simultaneously explain the characteristics of both stony iron and iron iva meteorites including the apparent correlation between metal composition and metallographic cooling rate observed for metal

application of proton microprobe data to trace element partitioning in volcanic rocks abstract in situ proton microprobe analyses are used to calculate partition coefficients d for mn fe cu zr ga rb sr y zr ba and pb and more restricted data for ni ge nb and as in pyroxenes olivines biotites hornblendes feldspars and fe ti oxides from 32 volcanic rocks all with glassy matrices these range from leucitite and picritic basalt to high silica and peralkaline rhyolites data for pigeonite aenigmatite allanite and leucite are included where these occur as additional phases coefficients have also been rayleigh fractionation corrected this correction being significant for those elements with high coefficients in specific mineral phases and where pronounced crystallisation has occurred partition coefficients are presented as plots vs nbo t ratios of coexisting glasses melts negative correlations are observed based on log transformed data for mn zn fe and y pyroxenes mn zn and fe olivines mn and zn fe ti oxides nb y sr and zr hornblendes sr plagioclase and ba cu zn and fe feldspars these element partition coefficients are not correlated with bulk mineral compositions zr and ga are not correlated with either glass or mineral compositions except zr in hornblende the correlations support the role of melt polymerisation in controlling element partitioning at least for those elements listed although possible effects of temperature cannot be uniquely isolated in the present data set the coefficients presented here are generally consistent with published values for equivalent rock compositions one difference being that some of the higher published coefficients e g sr in plagioclase are not matched in the present data set from a practical viewpoint the relative regularity of the coefficient data presented does facilitate choice of relevant coefficient values that are required for petrogenetic modelling procedures

partition coefficients of hf zr and ree between zircon apatite and liquid concentration ratios of hf zr and ree between zircon apatite and liquid were determined for three igneous compositions two andesites and a diorite the concentration ratios of these elements between zircon and corresponding liquid can approximate the partition coefficient although the concentration ratios between apatite and andesite groundmass can be considered as partition coefficients those for the apatite in the diorite may deviate from the partition coefficients the hree partition coefficients between zircon and liquid are very large 100 for er to 500 for lu and the hf partition coefficient is even larger the ree partition coefficients between apatite and liquid are convex upward and large d 10 100 whereas the hf and zr partition coefficients are less than 1 the large differences between partition coefficients of lu and hf for zircon liquid and for apatite liquid are confirmed these partition coefficients are useful for petrogenetic models involving zircon and apatite

rare earth element partition coefficients from enstatite melt synthesis experiments enstatite en80fs19wo01 was synthesized from a hypersthene normative basaltic melt doped at the same time with la ce nd sm eu dy er yb and lu the rare earth element concentrations were measured in both the basaltic glass by empa and the enstatite by sims rare earth element concentrations in the glass were determined by electron microprobe analysis with uncertainties less than two percent relative rare earth element concentrations in enstatite were determined by secondary ion mass spectrometry with uncertainties less than five percent relative the resulting rare earth element partition signature for enstatite is similar to previous calculated and composite low ca pigeonite signatures but is better defined and differs in several details first the enstatite lree signature is steeper than for pigeonite second the signature has a negative eu anomaly which relates to oxygen fugacity and third the dependence of the partition coefficients on alumina content is linked to crystal structural constraints

petrology of silicate inclusions in the sombrerete ungrouped iron meteorite implications for the origins of iie type silicate bearing irons the petrography and mineral and bulk chemistries of silicate inclusions in sombrerete an ungrouped iron that is one of the most phosphate rich meteorites known was studied using optical scanning electron microscopy sem electron microprobe analysis empa and secondary ion mass spectrometry sims techniques inclusions contain variable proportions of alkalic siliceous glass 69 vol of inclusions on average aluminous orthopyroxene 9 wo1 4fs2535 up to 3 wt al plagioclase 8 mainly an7092 cl apatite 7 chromite 4 yagiite 1 phosphaterich segregations 1 ilmenite and merrillite ytterbium and sm anomalies are sometimes present in various phases positive anomalies for phosphates negative for glass and orthopyroxene which possibly reflect phosphate melt gas partitioning under transient reducing conditions at high temperatures phosphate rich segregations and different alkalic glasses k rich and na rich formed by two types of liquid immiscibility yagiite a k mg silicate previously found in the colomera iie iron appears to have formed as a late stage crystallization product possibly aided by na k liquid unmixing trace element phase compositions reflect fractional crystallization of a single liquid composition that originated by low degree 48 equilibrium partial melting of a chondritic precursor compositional differences between inclusions appear to have originated as a result of a filter press differentiation process in which liquidus crystals of cl apatite and orthopyroxene were less able than silicate melt to flow through the metallic host between inclusions this process enabled a phosphoran basaltic andesite precursor liquid to differentiate within the metallic host yielding a dacite composition for some inclusions solidification was relatively rapid but not so fast as to prevent flow and immiscibility phenomena sombrerete originated near a cooling surface in the parent body during rapid probably impact induced mixing of metallic and silicate liquids we suggest that sombrerete formed when a planetesimal undergoing endogenic differentiation was collisionally disrupted possibly in a breakup and reassembly event simultaneous endogenic heating and impact processes may have widely affected silicate bearing irons and other solar system matter

apatite liquid partition coefficients for the rare earth elements and strontium abstract sixteen sets of apatite liquid partition coefficients dap liq for the rare earth elements ree la sm dy lu and six values for sr were experimentally determined in natural systems ranging from basanite to granite the apatite melt glass assemblages were obtained from starting glasses artificially enriched in ree sr and fluorapatite components these were run under dry and hydrous conditions of 7 5 20 kbar and 950 1120 c in a solid media piston cylinder apparatus an sem equipped electron microprobe was used for subsequent measurement of ree and sr concentrations in coexisting apatites and quenched glasses the resulting partition coefficient patterns resemble previously determined apatite phenocryst groundmass concentration ratios in the following respects 1 the rare earth patterns are uniformly concave downward i e the middle ree are more compatible in apatite than the light and heavy ree 2 dreeap liq is much higher for silicic melts than for basic ones and 3 strontium and therefore eu2 is less concentrated by apatite than are the trivalent ree the effects of both temperature and melt composition on dreeap liq are systematic and pronounced at 950 c for example a change in melt sio2 content from 50 to 68 wt causes the average ree partition coefficient to increase from 7 to 30 a 130 c increase in temperature on the other hand results in a two fold decrease in dreeap liq partitioning of sr is insenstitive to changes in melt composition and temperature and neither the sr nor the ree partition coefficients appear to be affected by variations in pressure or h2o content of the melt the experimentally determined partition coefficients can be used not only in trace element modelling but also to distinguish apatite phenocrysts from xenocrysts in rocks reported apatite megacryst host basalt ree concentration ratios 12 for example are considerably higher than the equilibrium partition coefficients which suggest that in this particular case the apatite is actually xenocrystic a reversal experiment incorporated in our study yielded diffusion profiles of ree in apatite from which we extracted a ree ca interdiffusion coefficient of 2 4 10 14 cm2 s at 1120 c extrapolated downward to crustal temperatures this low value suggests that complete ree equilibrium between felsic partial melts and residual apatite is rarely established

portales valley petrology of a metallic melt meteorite breccia portales valley pv is an unusual metal veined meteorite that has been classified as an h6 chondrite it has been regarded either as an annealed impact melt breccia as a primitive achondrite or as a meteorite with affinities to silicated iron meteorites we studied the petrology of pv using a variety of geochemical mineralogical techniques our results suggest that pv is the first well documented metallic melt meteorite breccia mineral chemical and other data suggest that the protolith to pv was an h chondrite the composition of feni metal in pv is somewhat fractionated compared to h chondrites and varies between coarse vein and silicate rich portions it is best modeled as having formed by partial melting at temperatures of 940 1150 c with incomplete separation of solid from liquid metal solid metal concentrated in the coarse vein areas and s bearing liquid metal concentrated in the silicate rich areas possibly as a result of a surface energy effect both carbon and phosphorus must have been scavenged from large volumes and concentrated in metallic liquid graphite nodules formed by crystallization from this liquid whereas phosphate formed by reaction between p bearing metal and clinopyroxene components depleting clinopyroxene throughout much of the meteorite and growing coarse phosphate at metal silicate interfaces some phosphate probably crystallized from p bearing liquids but most probably formed by solid state reaction at 975 725 c phosphate forming and feo reduction reactions were widespread in pv and entailed a change in the mineralogy of the stony portion on a large scale portales valley experienced protracted annealing from supersolidus to subsolidus temperatures probably by cooling at depth within its parent body but the main differences between pv and h chondrites arose because maximum temperatures were higher in pv a combination of a relatively weak shock event and elevated pre shock temperatures probably produced the vein and breccia texture with endogenic heating being the main heat source for melting and with stress waves from an impact event being an essential trigger for mobilizing metal portales valley is best classified as an h7 metallic melt breccia of shock stage s1 the meteorite is transitional between more primitive chondritic and evolved achondrite iron meteorite types and offers clues as to how differentiation could have occurred in some asteroidal bodies

experimentally determined mineral melt partition coefficients for sc y and ree for olivine orthopyroxene pigeonite magnetite and ilmenite our current lack of understanding of the partitioning behavior of sc y and the ree rare earth elements can be attributed directly to the lack of a sufficiently large or chemically diverse experimental data set to address this problem we conducted a series of experiments using several different natural composition lavas doped with the elements of interest as starting compositions microprobe analyses of orthopyroxene pigeonite olivine magnetite ilmenite and co existing glasses in the experimental charges were used to calculate expressions that describe ree partitioning as a function of a variety of system parameters using expressions that represent mineral melt reactions versus element ratio distribution coefficients it is possible to calculate terms that express low ca pyroxene melt partitioning behavior and are independent of both pyroxene and melt composition compositional variations suggest that sc substitution in olivine involves either a paired substitution with al or more commonly with vacancies the partitioning of sc is dependent both on melt composition and temperature our experimentally determined olivine melt ree ds partition coefficients are similar to but slightly higher than those reported by mckay 1986 and support their conclusions that olivines are strongly lree depleted y and ree mineral melt partition coefficients for magnetite range from 0 003 for la to 0 02 for lu ilmenite partition coefficients range from 0 007 for la to 0 029 for lu these experimental values are two orders of magnitude lower than many of the published values determined by phenocryst matrix separation techniques

partitioning of zirconium between clinopyroxene and magmatic liquids of intermediate composition abstract the partitioning of zr between clinopyroxenes and hydrous intermediate magmatic liquids was investigated in a series of experiments at 9 10 kbar and 950 1000 c the mean of seven measurements of the clinopyroxene melt partition coefficient is 0 27 in good agreement with estimates based on phenocryst matrix concentration ratios in natural rocks

comparative petrology of silicates in the udei station iab and miles iie iron meteorites implications for the origin of silicate bearing irons abstract the textures and mineral chemistries of silicate inclusions in the udei station iab and miles fractionated iie iron meteorites were studied using optical and electron microscopy sem empa and la icp ms techniques to better understand the origin of silicate bearing irons inclusions in udei station include near chondritic basaltic gabbroic feldspathic orthopyroxenitic and harzburgitic lithologies in miles most inclusions can be described as feldspathic pyroxenite or pyroxene enriched basalt gabbro the trace element compositions of both orthopyroxene and plagioclase grains are similar in different lithologies from udei station whereas in different inclusions from miles the compositions of orthopyroxene grains are similar while those of clinopyroxene plagioclase and especially cl apatite are variable orthopyroxene in miles tends to be enriched in ree compared to that in udei station but the reverse is true for plagioclase and clinopyroxene the data can be explained by models involving partial melting of chondritic protoliths silicate melt migration and redox reactions between silicate and metal components to form phosphate the extent of heating melt migration and phosphate formation were all greater in miles silicates in miles were formed from liquids produced by 30 partial melting of a chondritic precursor brought to a peak temperature of 1250 c this silicate melt crystallized in two stages during stage 1 crystallizing minerals orthopyroxene clinopyroxene chromite and olivine were largely in equilibrium with an intercumulus melt that was evolving by igneous fractionation during slow cooling with a residence time of 20 ka at 1150 c during stage 2 following probable re melting of feldspathic materials and after the silicate mush was mixed with molten metal plagioclase and phosphate fractionally crystallized together during more rapid cooling down to the solidus in udei station despite a lower peak temperature we suggest that a model involving major collisional disruption and mixing of partly molten endogenically heated planetesimals can best explain the data for iab and fractionated iie silicate bearing irons the extent of endogenic heating was different less for the iabs and the amount of parent body disruption was different scrambling with collisional unroofing for the iab iiicd winonaite body more complete destruction for the fractionated iie body but both bodies were partly molten and incompletely differentiated at the time of impact we suggest that the post impact secondary body for iab iiicd winonaite meteorites was mineralogically zoned with ni poor metal in the center and that the secondary body for fractionated iie meteorites was a relatively small melt rich body that had separated from olivine during collisional break up

lunar ferroan anorthosite petrogenesis clues from trace element distributions in fan subgroups the rare earth elements ree and selected other trace elements were measured in plagioclase and pyroxene from nine samples of the lunar ferroan anorthosite fan suite of rocks samples were selected from each of four fan subgroups previously defined by james et al 1989 plagioclase compositions are homogeneous within each sample but high and low ca pyroxenes from lithic clasts typically have different ree abundances from their counterparts in the surrounding granulated matrices measured plagioclase low ca pyroxene concentration ratios for the ree have steeper patterns than experimentally determined plagioclase low ca pyroxene partition coefficients in most samples textural and trace element evidence suggest that although subsolidus equilibration may be responsible for some of the discrepancy plagioclase compositions in most samples have been largely unaffected by intermineral redistribution of the ree the ree systematics of plagioclase from the four subgroups are broadly consistent with their derivation through crystallization from a single evolving magma however samples from some of the subgroups exhibit a decoupling of plagioclase and pyroxene compositions that probably reflects the complexities inherent in crystallization from a large scale magmatic system for example two anorthosites with very magnesian mafic minerals have highly evolved trace element compositions major element compositions in plagioclase also do not reflect the evolutionary sequence recorded by their ree compositions finally a noritic anorthosite breccia with relatively ferroan mafic minerals contains several clasts with high and variable ree and other trace element abundances although plagioclase ree compositions are consistent with their derivation from a magma with a kreepy trace element signature very shallow ree patterns in the pyroxenes suggest the addition of a component enriched in the light ree

kinetic effects on trace element partitioning kinetic effects on trace element partitioning have been measured for anorthite forsterite and diopside grown from synthetic compositions doped with ree a seeding technique allowed determination of crystal growth rates and partitioning information was obtained from electron microprobe analyses compositional deviations from equilibrium values were sought in the crystals and as gradients in the quenched liquids adjacent to the crystals the principal result is that large deviations in trace element distribution coefficients from equilibrium values do not occur because of a compensating effect rapid growth depletes the melt adjacent to the crystal in the elements of which the crystal is composed leading to different values for apparent distribution coefficients however as the boundary layer melt becomes depleted in the components of the crystal growth slows and the size of the compositional perturbations decreases crystals grown at very high rates e g 0 2 m sec for diopside tended to be too small for accurate microprobe analyses but are probably not compositionally extreme since the melts adjacent to the crystals did not acquire sizable compositional gradients at moderately high growth rates e g 0 02 m sec crystals form in the presence of boundary layer compositions perturbed by as much as 10 from bulk melt values and in diopside attain concentrations for excluded trace elements about 70 higher than equilibrium values for crystals plus bulk melt at the slower growth rates typical of igneous systems kinetic effects on trace element partitioning are probably negligible

a nonmagmatic origin of group iie iron meteorites abstract new neutron activation data on 10 elements in 12 iie and iie related irons lead to a reclassification of several irons seymchan and lonaconing are removed from iie and leshan added four iie members are designated iie an to call attention to some anomalous properties the eight normal iie members define element ni trends generally similar to those in the nonmagmatic group iab the small negative slopes on w ni and ir ni diagrams are strongly indicative of a nonmagmatic origin of the iie irons we propose that iie irons like iab irons originated as individual pools of impact produced melt in the near surface region of a chondritic parent body the positive as ni and au ni trends are the only evidence suggesting fractional crystallization but their slopes are lower than those in magmatic group iiiab and only slightly higher than those of cu and sb in iab we suggest that the s and c contents of the iie precursor materials were much lower than those of the iab precursors thus higher temperatures were required to generate enough metallic melt to segregate into pools these higher temperatures are also reflected in the nonchondritic compositions of the silicate inclusions

trace element partitioning in pantellerites and trachytes abstract in order to investigate the effect of increasing melt peralkalinity on partitioning partition coefficients have been determined using neutron activation analyses of coexisting phenocrysts and glass of five samples from pantelleria spanning the range trachyte to pantellerite alkali feldspar partition coefficients for fe rb ba sr and eu vary with melt peralkalinity due to changes in melt polymerization and to the systematic increase in xor and decrease in xan of the feldspar in going from trachyte to pantellerite fe partition coefficients increase from 0 04 to 0 10 presumably because fe 3 increasingly substitutes in the feldspar tetrahedral site as melt activity of al declines and fe concentrations increase partition coefficients for trivalent light rees decrease and the partitioning pattern becomes flatter the most evolved samples having some of the lowest published values for feldspar the hundredfold decline in eu partition coefficients 2 5 to 0 024 and the decrease in the size of the positive partitioning anomaly are attributed to increasing eu3 eu2 in the melt as it becomes more peralkaline as well as to concomitant decrease in the ca content of feldspar as a result the behavior of eu during fractional crystallization of peralkaline suites is fundamentally different from that in metaluminous suites absolute abundances rise and the size of the negative eu anomaly changes little with fractionation beyond pantelleritic trachyte barium and strontium do not decline to extremely low concentrations in pantellerites as they do in highly evolved metaluminous rhyolites because the feldspar partition coefficients drop precipitously with peralkalinity similarly rb contents do not get large because the partition coefficient increases slightly 0 11 to 0 25 with peralkalinity and is sufficient to make rb only weakly incompatible in the feldspar dominated assemblage partition coefficients calculated for sr and ba from natural phenocryst matrix pairs can be gross over estimates in these feldspar rich felsic rocks if phenocrysts are zoned this effect is severe for assemblages with bulk distribution coefficients d greater than 4 even at very small crystal contents and for 4 d 2 it is significant if crystal contents exceed about 25 some of the very high values and much of the variability reported in the literature for ba and sr feldspar partition coefficients may be a result of this effect in contrast to feldspar partition coefficients for apatite and mafic phases change little with peralkalinity partition coefficients for rees and the compatible elements sc co and cr are all less than half those in fe rich clinopyroxene and olivine of similar composition in high silica rhyolite although absolute levels of partition coefficients are a function of melt polymerization the shapes of the ree partitioning patterns appear to be related to the composition of the clinopyroxene scandium is most strongly concentrated in clinopyroxene partition coefficient 27 60 having larger values in more fe rich compositions apatite shows a wide range in composition within the suite the concentrations of si fe rees and y increasing and mg ca and p decreasing in more evolved samples these trends however parallel those in coexisting glasses so that partition coefficients are essentially constant in peralkaline suites cs is the most incompatible of commonly analyzed elements but its great mobility during alteration and weathering limits its use as a differentiation index next in order of incompatibility are th u hf zr and ta which have small but finite values of d due to the partitioning of th and u into apatite 2 the accommodation of zr and hf by clinopyroxene 0 4 and titanomagnetite 0 2 and relatively high concentrations of ta in cossyrite and fe ti oxides the next most incompatible are the lightest and the heaviest rees and finally the middle trivalent rees and rb plots of pairs of relatively incompatible elements form straight line trends over large compositional ranges in peralkaline suites because the replacement of olivine titanomagnetite by cossyrite as the melt becomes more peralkaline causes little change in d the ree patterns of titanomagnetite and cossyrite are both approximately flat at values less than 0 1 and the relatively high titanomagnetite partition coefficients for ta 2 zr and hf when combined with the very low partition coefficients for these elements for olivine approximate the moderate partition coefficients for cossyrite

properties of the guin ungrouped iron meteorite the origin of guin and of group iie irons abstract guin is an ungrouped iron meteorite containing 45 g g ga and 186 g g ge it is a coarse octahedrite with an unusually high ni content 92 5 mg g its metal composition is generally similar to irons in groups iab and iiicd but its closest relative is the cruz del aire ungrouped iron guin contains 6 3 vol silicate inclusions that are petrologically and compositionally similar to those in iie irons the largest inclusion 2 4 cm consists primarily of a shock melted plagioclase rich matrix surrounding large 1 15 mm partly melted augite grains the oxygen isotopic composition of the inclusion 18 o 5 29 17 o 3 87 is near the ll chondrite field the guin inclusion is similar in bulk composition to selected melt pocket glasses in ordinary chondrites produced in situ by preferential melting of plagioclase by shock compression we suggest that the guin assemblage formed by impact melting on a chondritic parent body silicate inclusions in iie irons share many petrologic and compositional but not oxygen isotopic characteristics with the guin inclusions suggesting that iie irons also formed by impact melting of chondritic materials individual iie irons were probably derived from separate cratering events

mineralogy petrology chemistry and 39ar 40ar and exposure ages of the caddo county iab iron evidence for early partial melt segregation of a gabbro area rich in plagioclase diopside we describe coarse grained gabbroic material rich in plagioclase and diopside in the caddo county iab iron meteorite the gabbro is not a clast within a breccia but rather is an area with transitional margins located mainly at silicate metal boundaries only a few cm away from fine grained ultramafic silicates similar to winonaites medium grained orthopyroxene and olivine are found in transitional areas and show no shock disturbance of their textures a vein like region starting in an area of fine grained ultramafic silicate extends towards the gabbroic area with a gradual increase in abundance of plagioclase and diopside these textures and mineralogies suggest that the gabbroic materials were formed by inhomogeneous segregation of partial melts from chondritic source materials compositional data on two mineralogically distinct samples of the gabbro rich portion of the inclusion were obtained by inaa compared to an average of iab silicate inclusions or winonaites the caddo county gabbro is enriched in the incompatible lithophile elements na ca sc ree and hf consistent with a melt origin for the gabbro the cosmogenic space exposure age of caddo county 5 1 ma is significantly younger than exposure ages of some other iab meteorites an 39ar 40ar age determination of the gabbroic material indicates a series of upward steps in age from 4 516 ga to 4 523 ga with a few high temperature ages up to 4 54 ga the older age could approximate the primary recrystallization age of silicates the stepped ar age spectrum may indicate differences in ar closure temperatures during slow cooling of 2 20 c myr in the parent body alternatively the younger ar ar ages may date a shock event which occurred while caddo county was hot and which also created textures such as a linear metal vein with rounded zigzag walls in a diopside crystal and slightly misoriented rounded plagioclase domain

the evolution of partially differentiated planetesimals evidence from iron meteorite groups iab and iiicd group iab irons probably come from a parent body that partially differentiated into a sulfur rich molten core and a primitive silicate outer layer in which only minor or localized melting occurred although the complexity of meteorites from this parent body or bodies irons with and without massive silicate inclusions stony meteorites like winona sulfide rich meteorites like mundrabilla etc implies a complicated history the partial differentiation model is consistent with most properties of these meteorites the behavior of five model parent bodies of different composition during heating to 1400 k the temperature recorded in many i ab silicates shows that meteorites like iab irons can form by this process sulfide rich parent bodies differentiate into a liquid s rich core and a primitive metal bearing mantle around 1230 k but in parent bodies lower in sulfide abundance this process may be delayed until minor melting of silicates occurs 1370 30 k in most cases any silicate melt that may have formed resolidified in situ the sulfide melt fractionally crystallized along the fe ni fes cotectic some melt was injected into silicates to form copiapo type breccias considerations of graphite metal silicate equilibrium and the retention of noble gases suggest that brecciated iabs formed at depth inside a moderately large a few tens to a hundred kilometers parent body the correlation of i xe ages with ni content is interpreted as the result of an excess 129xe component associated with the s rich melt which increases with melt evolution

carbon dioxide concentration in temperate climate caves and parent soils over an altitudinal gradient and its influence on speleothem growth and fabrics carbon dioxide co2 concentrations in caves and parent soils in the italian alps have been studied along a 2100 m altitudinal range corresponding to a mean annual temperature mat range of 12 c in order to investigate the relationship between mat soil pco2 and cave air pco2 and to test the influence of soil pco2 on speleothem growth and fabric to ultimately gain insight into their palaeoclimatic significance in temperate climate settings our findings indicate that soil co2 is linearly correlated to mat and its mean annual concentration is described by the equation soil co2 ppmv 1112 460 mat soil pco2 can also be exponentially correlated to actual evapotranspiration the pco2 in the aquifer is linearly correlated to mat at the infiltration site and is more influenced by summer soil pco2 cave air co2 in the innermost part of the caves exhibits a similar seasonal pattern and commonly reaches concentrations of about 15 to 35 with respect to the corresponding soil values and is exponentially correlated to the mat at the infiltration site the combination of these parameters soil pco2 dripwater pco2 and cave air pco2 results in speleothem growth and controls their fabrics which are typical of four mat elevation belts broadly corresponding to the present day vegetation zones in the lower montane zone 100 800 m above sea level a s l speleothems mostly consist of columnar fabric in the upper montane zone 800 1600 m a s l both columnar and dendritic fabrics are common the subalpine zone 1600 2200 m a s l is characterized mostly by moonmilk deposits whereas in the alpine zone above 2200 m a s l no speleothems are forming today therefore fabric changes in fossil speleothem can potentially be used to reconstruct mat changes in temperate climate karst areas copyright 2015 john wiley sons ltd

timing constraints on building an intermediate plutonic arc crustal section u pb zircon geochronology of the sierra valle fertil la huerta famatinian arc argentina 1 the sierra valle fertil range in northwestern argentina exposes a tilted crustal section through the ordovician famatinian arc from 25 km to shallow crustal paleodepths fourteen new u pb zircon crystallization ages of magmatic rocks from sierra valle fertil area show that this section of the arc was built over a short time interval during the ordovician between 485 and 465 ma zircon rim ages demonstrate that high grade metamorphism and migmatization were synchronous with magmatic emplacement inherited ages in some of the plutonic rocks as well as detrital zircons in the metasedimentary framework suggest that the famatinian arc was emplaced into a thick miogeoclinal cover to the thinned margin of the proto south american continent in the ordovician which represents a part of gondwana docking of the precordilleran terrane outboard of proto south america led to the cessation of arc magmatism in the valle fertil area and preservation of the arc in its early stages after 60 myr of subduction during the pampean and famatinian magmatic stages our age data from the sierra valle fertil indicate that wet mafic magmas were emplaced into the section at a rate typical for modern island arcs 30 km3 km 1 myr 1 the production of intermediate to felsic magmas in the upper plate was a result of partial melting of the metasedimentary framework and hybridization with mantle derived melts and resulted in the generation of tonalites granodiorites and granites in the upper crust at a rate of 100 km3 km 1 myr 1 similar to major magmatic flare ups in the mature arcs of north american cordillera the sierra valle fertil arc section is a type example of an immature cordilleran arc before major crustal thickening and crustal overturn takes place in the upper plate the famatinian arc section may also be an equivalent to the crustal architecture of more mature modern island arcs such as parts of the aleutians caribbean and japan

a petrologic and isotopic study of winonaites evidence for early partial melting brecciation and metamorphism we have conducted detailed petrologic chemical and isotopic studies of winonaites to ascertain the genesis of this group of meteorites winonaites have reduced mineral compositions and mineralogy and oxygen isotopic compositions distinct from primitive achondrite groups other than silicate inclusions in iab and iiicd irons however winonaites differ from iab and iiicd irons in that they lack the metallic matrices of the latter and consist mostly of silicates on the basis of these criteria winona mount morris wisconsin tierra blanca pontlyfni y 74025 y 75300 y 8005 and que 94535 are winonaites and y 75305 and y 75261 may be winonaites winonaites are fine to medium grained mostly equigranular rocks pontlyfni and mount morris wisconsin contain what appear to be relict chondrules several winonaites contain mm sized areas that differ substantially in grain size and or silicate mineralogy from the surrounding matrix fe ni fes veins are common in many winonaites mineral compositions are intermediate between e and h chondrites and reduced sulfides are observed in low feo winonaites bulk major element compositions are roughly chondritic although ree elements are fractionated the 39ar 40ar ages of three winonaites range from 4 40 ga mount morris wisconsin to 4 54 ga pontlyfni cosmic ray exposure ages are 20 80 ma trapped noble gases in these winonaites resemble those in enstatite chondrites we suggest that the winonaites formed from a chondritic precursor material unlike that of known chondrites in mineral and oxygen isotopic compositions and this material may have been heterogeneous in composition extensive heating caused metamorphism and partial melting of both fe ni fes and silicate material impact brecciation during cooling mixed lithologies with different thermal histories and subsequent metamorphism produced recrystallization grain growth and reduction of mafic silicates the 39ar 40ar ages indicate that cooling may have been more rapid than observed in iab irons although later resetting may have occurred

constraints on the role of impact heating and melting in asteroids received 1996 august 30 accepted in revised form 1997 january 30 abstract imaging of asteroids gaspra and ida and laboratory studies of asteroidal meteorites show that im pacts undoubtedly played an important role in the histories of asteroids and resulted in shock metamorphism and the formation of breccias and melt rocks however in recent years impact has also been called upon by numerous authors as the heat source for some of the major geological processes that took place on asteroids such as global thermal metamorphism of chondrite parent bodies and a variety of melting and igneous events the latter were proposed to explain the origin of ureilites aubrites mesosiderites the eagle station pallasites acapulcoites lodranites and the iab iiicd and iie irons we considered fundamental observations from terrestrial impact craters combined with results from laboratory shock experiments and theoretical consider ations to evaluate the efficiency of impact heating and melting of asteroids studies of terrestrial impact craters and relevant shock experiments suggest that impact heating of aster oids will produce two types of impact melts 1 large scale whole rock melts total melts not partial melts at high shock pressure and 2 localized melts formed at the scale of the mineral constituents mineral specific or grain boundary melting at intermediate shock pressures the localized melts form minuscule amounts of melt that quench and solidify in sifu thus preventing them from pooling into larger melt bodies partial melting as defined in petrology has not been observed in natural and experimental shock metamor phism and is thermodynamically impossible in a shock wave induced transient compression of rocks the total impact melts produced represent a minuscule portion of the displaced rock volume of the parent crater internal differentiation by fractional crystallization is absent in impact melt sheets of craters of sizes that can be tolerated by asteroids and impact melt rocks are usually clast laden thermal metamorphism of country rocks by impact is extremely minor experimental and theoretical considerations suggest that 1 single dis ruptive impacts cannot raise the average global temperature of strength or gravity dominated asteroids by more than a few degrees 2 cumulative global heating of asteroids by multiple impacts is ineffective for asteroids less than a few hundred kilometers in diameter 3 small crater size low gravity and low impact velocity suggest that impact melt volume in single asteroidal impacts is a very small 0 014 1 fraction of the total displaced crater volume 4 total impact melt volume formed during the typical lifetime of an asteroid is a small fraction 0 001 of the volume of impact generated debris and 5 much of the impact melt generated on asteroidal targets is ejected from craters with velocities greater than escape velocity and thus not retained on the asteroid the inescapable conclusion from these observations and calculations is that impacts cannot have been the heat source for the origin of the meteorite types listed above and we must turn to processes other than impact such as decay of short lived radionuclides or electromagnetic induction during an early t tauri phase of the sun to explain heating and melting of the parent bodies of these meteorites

clinopyroxene ree distribution coefficients for shergottites the ree content of the shergotty melt abstract ree distribution coefficients were measured between synthetic pyroxenes and melts similar in composition to the inferred shergotty intercumulus liquid by in situ analysis with the electron microprobe using samples doped to per cent concentration levels these coefficients exhibit a strong positive correlation with pyroxene wollastonite content recommended values for augites similar in composition to the shergotty cumulus augite cores wo32en48 are d la 0 023 d ce 0 039 d nd 0 10 d sm 0 17 d eu 0 16 d gd 0 20 d yb 0 29 and d lu 0 30 recommended values for pigeonites similar in composition to the shergotty cumulus pigeonite cores wo12en58 are d la 0 002 d ce 0 004 d nd 0 019 d sm 0 031 d yb 0 13 and d lu 0 13 these values resemble distribution coefficients measured for terrestrial basalts of higher mg fe than the shergotty melt rather than those of more evolved siliceous rocks of similar mg fe to the shergotty melt thus it appears that mg fe is considerably less important than other factors in determining distribution coefficient values for pyroxenes ree abundances were computed for the shergotty intercumulus melt using distribution coefficients measured for the natural phase compositions these computed abundances display lree depletion such lree depleted abundance patterns cannot be generated by simple partial melting of a mafic mineral assemblage having the lree enriched patterns required for a two stage sm nd evolution history this result implies that either 1 the melting process was complex e g continuous melting 2 the source region had a more complex history than that of the simple 2 stage model or 3 shergotty does not satisfy the closed system assumption of the calculation and has suffered post magmatic lree enrichment

the iab iron meteorite complex a group five subgroups numerous grouplets closely related mainly formed by crystal segregation in rapidly cooling melts abstract we present new data for iron meteorites that are members of group iab or are closely related to this large group and we have also reevaluated some of our earlier data for these irons in the past it was not possible to distinguish iab and iiicd irons on the basis of their positions on element ni diagrams but we now show that plotting the new and revised data yields six sets of compact fields on element au diagrams each set corresponding to a compositional group the largest set includes the majority 70 of irons previously designated ia we christened this set the iab main group the remaining five sets we designate subgroups within the iab complex three of these subgroups have au contents similar to the main group and form parallel trends on most element ni diagrams the groups originally designated iiic and iiid are two of these subgroups they are now well resolved from each other and from the main group the other low au subgroup has ni contents just above the main group two other iab subgroups have appreciably higher au contents than the main group and show weaker compositional links to it we have named these five subgroups on the basis of their au and ni contents the three subgroups having au contents similar to the main group are the low au l subgroups the two others the high au h subgroups the ni contents are designated high h medium m or low l thus the old group iiid is now the slh subgroup the old group iiic is the slm subgroup in addition eight irons assigned to two grouplets plot between sll and slm on most element au diagrams a large number 27 of related irons plot outside these compact fields but nonetheless appear to be sufficiently related to also be included in the iab complex many of these irons contain coarse silicates having similar properties most are roughly chondritic in composition the mafic silicates show evidence of reduction during metamorphism in each case the silicate o isotopic composition is within the carbonaceous chondrite range 17o 0 3 in all but four cases these are within the so called iab range 0 30 17o 0 68 fine silicates appear to be ubiquitous in the main group and low au subgroups this requires that viscosities in the parental melt reached high values before buoyancy could separate these the well defined main group trends on element au diagrams provide constraints for evaluating possible models we find the evidence to be most consistent with a crystal segregation model in which solid and melt are essentially at equilibrium the main arguments against the main group having formed by fractional crystallization are a the small range in ir and b the evidence for rapid crystallization and a high cooling rate through the iron stability field the evidence for the latter are the small sizes of the iron crystals parental to the widmanstatten pattern and the limited thermal effects recorded in the silicates including retention of albitic plagioclase and abundant primordial rare gases in contrast crystal segregation in a cooling metallic melt and related processes such as incomplete melting and melt migration can produce the observed trends in the main group we infer that this melt was formed by impact heating on a porous chondritic body and that the melt was initially hotter than the combined mix of silicates and metal in the local region the melt cooled rapidly by heat conduction into the cooler surroundings mainly silicates we suggest that the close compositional relationships between the main group and the low au subgroups are the result of similar processes instigated by independent impact events that occurred either at separate locations on the same asteroid or on separate but compositionally similar asteroids

experimental determination of crystal melt partitioning of ga and ge in the system forsterite anorthite diopside the crystal liquid partitioning of ga and ge has been measured experimentally between forsterite diopside anorthite and spinel and melts in the pseudoternary system forsterite anorthite diopside at one atmosphere pressure and 1300 c gallium is incompatible with forsterite and diopside d ga 0 024 and 0 19 respectively is only slightly incompatible in anorthite d ga 0 86 and is highly compatible in spinel d ga 4 6 the partition coefficient for ge is within a factor of two of unity for forsterite diopside and anorthite d ge 0 62 1 4 and 0 51 respectively but ge is incompatible in spinel d ge 0 1 the coefficients for the exchange of ga and al and the exchange of ge and si between minerals and melts generally are within a factor of two of unity as is expected from the geochemical coherence of these element pairs in natural samples the application of our results to the interpretation of natural basaltic and mantle samples from the earth and basalts from the moon and the shergottite parent body demonstrates that it is possible to discriminate between different mantle source compositions using ga al and ge si ratios the ge variation among lunar mare basalts may be indicative of a heterogeneous lunar mantle the substantial depletion of ge in chassigny relative to the other snc meteorites may be evidence of either a heterogeneous shergottite parent body spb mantle or of different geochemical behavior for ge in the spb