Evidence for high temperature in the upper mantle beneath Cape Verde archipelago from Rayleigh-wave phase-velocity measurements

Abstract

Cape Verde is an intraplate archipelago located in the Atlantic Ocean about 560km west of Senegal, on an ∼ 130 Ma old oceanic lithosphere. The upper-mantle structure beneath the islands was poorly known, until recently, in large part due to the lack of broadband seismic stations. In this study we used data from two temporary deployments across the archipelago, measuring the phase velocities of Rayleigh-waves fundamental-modes in a broad period range (8–250s), by cross-correlating teleseismic earthquake data between pairs of stations. We derived a robust average, phase-velocity curve for the Cape Verde region, and inverted it for a shear-wave velocity profile. Our results show significantly low velocities of ∼ 4.2km/s in the asthenosphere, indicating the presence of anomalously high temperatures and, eventually, partial melting. The temperature anomaly is probably responsible for the thermal rejuvenation of the lithosphere to an effective age as young as about 30 Ma, which we infer from the comparison of seismic velocities beneath Cape Verde archipelago and those representative of different ages in the Central Atlantic. The anomalously high temperature in the asthenosphere, together with previously published evidence on low seismic velocities in the lower mantle and relatively He-unradiogenic isotopic ratios, suggests a hot plume, rooted deep in the lower mantle, as the origin of the Cape Verde hotspot.