Nanoscale silicate melt textures determine volcanic ash surface chemistry.

ABSTRACT: Explosive volcanic eruptions produce vast quantities of silicate ash, whose surfaces are subsequently altered during atmospheric transit. These altered surfaces mediate environmental interactions, including atmospheric ice nucleation, and toxic effects in biota. A lack of knowledge of the initial, pre-altered ash surface has required previous studies to assume that the ash surface composition created during magmatic fragmentation is equivalent to the bulk particle assemblage. Here we examine ash particles generated by controlled fragmentation of andesite and find that fragmentation generates ash particles with substantial differences in surface chemistry. We attribute this disparity to observations of nanoscale melt heterogeneities, in which Fe-rich nanophases in the magmatic melt deflect

SUBMITTER: Hornby AJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10789741 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature