Dataset Information

Trans-crustal structural control of CO₂-rich extensional magmatic systems revealed at Mount Erebus Antarctica.

ABSTRACT: Erebus volcano, Antarctica, with its persistent phonolite lava lake, is a classic example of an evolved, CO₂-rich rift volcano. Seismic studies provide limited images of the magmatic system. Here we show using magnetotelluric data that a steep, melt-related conduit of low electrical resistivity originating in the upper mantle undergoes pronounced lateral re-orientation in the deep crust before reaching shallower magmatic storage and the summit lava lake. The lateral turn represents a structural fault-valve controlling episodic flow of magma and CO₂ vapour, which replenish and heat the high level phonolite differentiation zone. This magmatic valve lies within an inferred, east-west structural trend forming part of an accommodation zone across the southern termination of the Terror Rift, providing a dilatant magma pathway. Unlike H₂O-rich subduction arc volcanoes, CO₂-dominated Erebus geophysically shows continuous magmatic structure to shallow crustal depths of < 1 km, as the melt does not experience decompression-related volatile supersaturation and viscous stalling.

SUBMITTER: Hill GJ

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9151792 | biostudies-literature | 2022 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Trans-crustal structural control of CO<sub>2</sub>-rich extensional magmatic systems revealed at Mount Erebus Antarctica.

Hill G J GJ Wannamaker P E PE Maris V V Stodt J A JA Kordy M M Unsworth M J MJ Bedrosian P A PA Wallin E L EL Uhlmann D F DF Ogawa Y Y Kyle P P

Nature communications 20220530 1

Erebus volcano, Antarctica, with its persistent phonolite lava lake, is a classic example of an evolved, CO<sub>2</sub>-rich rift volcano. Seismic studies provide limited images of the magmatic system. Here we show using magnetotelluric data that a steep, melt-related conduit of low electrical resistivity originating in the upper mantle undergoes pronounced lateral re-orientation in the deep crust before reaching shallower magmatic storage and the summit lava lake. The lateral turn represents a ...[more]

PMID: 35637190

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Project description:The Earth's crust hosts a subsurface, dark, and oligotrophic biosphere that is poorly understood in terms of the energy supporting its biomass production and impact on food webs at the Earth's surface. Dark oligotrophic volcanic ecosystems (DOVEs) are good environments for investigations of life in the absence of sunlight as they are poor in organics, rich in chemical reactants and well known for chemical exchange with Earth's surface systems. Ice caves near the summit of Mt. Erebus (Antarctica) offer DOVEs in a polar alpine environment that is starved in organics and with oxygenated hydrothermal circulation in highly reducing host rock. We surveyed the microbial communities using PCR, cloning, sequencing and analysis of the small subunit (16S) ribosomal and Ribulose-1,5-bisphosphate Carboxylase/Oxygenase (RubisCO) genes in sediment samples from three different caves, two that are completely dark and one that receives snow-filtered sunlight seasonally. The microbial communities in all three caves are composed primarily of Bacteria and fungi; Archaea were not detected. The bacterial communities from these ice caves display low phylogenetic diversity, but with a remarkable diversity of RubisCO genes including new deeply branching Form I clades, implicating the Calvin-Benson-Bassham (CBB) cycle as a pathway of CO2 fixation. The microbial communities in one of the dark caves, Warren Cave, which has a remarkably low phylogenetic diversity, were analyzed in more detail to gain a possible perspective on the energetic basis of the microbial ecosystem in the cave. Atmospheric carbon (CO2 and CO), including from volcanic emissions, likely supplies carbon and/or some of the energy requirements of chemoautotrophic microbial communities in Warren Cave and probably other Mt. Erebus ice caves. Our work casts a first glimpse at Mt. Erebus ice caves as natural laboratories for exploring carbon, energy and nutrient sources in the subsurface biosphere and the nutritional limits on life.

Dataset Information

Trans-crustal structural control of CO₂-rich extensional magmatic systems revealed at Mount Erebus Antarctica.

Publications

Trans-crustal structural control of CO<sub>2</sub>-rich extensional magmatic systems revealed at Mount Erebus Antarctica.

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Dataset Information

Trans-crustal structural control of CO2-rich extensional magmatic systems revealed at Mount Erebus Antarctica.

Publications

Trans-crustal structural control of CO<sub>2</sub>-rich extensional magmatic systems revealed at Mount Erebus Antarctica.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets

Trans-crustal structural control of CO₂-rich extensional magmatic systems revealed at Mount Erebus Antarctica.