Noble gas study of HIMU and EM ocean island basalts in the Polynesian region

Abstract

Listen

Translate article

Noble gas isotopes of HIMU and EM ocean island basalts from the Cook-Austral and Society Islands were investigated to constrain their origins. Separated olivine and clinopyroxene (cpx) phenocrysts were used for noble gas analyses. Since samples are relatively old, obtained from the oceanic area and showing chemical zoning in cpx phenocrysts, several tests on sample preparation and gas extraction methods were performed. First, by comparing heating and crushing methods, it has been confirmed that the crushing method is suitable to obtain inherent magmatic noble gases without radiogenic and cosmogenic components which were yielded after eruption, especially for He and Ne analyses. Second, noble gas compositions in the core and the rim of cpx phenocrysts were measured to evaluate the zoning effect on noble gases. The result has been that noble gas concentrations and He and Ne isotope ratios are different between them. The enrichment of noble gases in the rim compared to the core is probably due to fractional crystallization. Difference of He and Ne isotope ratios is explained by cosmogenic effect, and isotope ratios of the trapped component seem to be similar between the rim and the core. Third, leaching test reveals no systematic differences in noble gas compositions between leached and unleached samples. 3He/ 4He ratios of HIMU samples in the Cook-Austral Islands are uniform irrespective of phenocryst type (olivine and cpx) and age of samples (10–18 Ma), and lower (average 6.8 R A) than those of the Pacific MORB. On the other hand, 3He/ 4He of EM samples in the Cook-Austral Islands are similar to MORB values. EM samples in the Society Islands show rather higher 3He/ 4He than MORB. Ne, Kr and Xe isotope ratios are almost atmospheric within analytical uncertainties. 40Ar/ 36Ar are not so high as those of MORB. Anomalous noble gas abundance pattern such as He and Ne depletion and Kr and Xe enrichment relative to atmospheric abundances was observed. Furthermore, Ne/Ar and Kr/Ar show correlation with some trace elemental ratios like La/Yb. Lower 3He/ 4He of HIMU than MORB values requires relatively high time-integrated (U + Th)/ 3He for the HIMU source, which suggests that the HIMU source was produced from recycled materials which had been once located near the Earth’s surface. Moreover, extreme noble gas abundance pattern and strong correlation of Ne/Ar and Kr/Ar with La/Yb indicate that the HIMU endmember is highly depleted in light noble gases and enriched in heavy noble gases. Such feature is not common to mantle materials and is rather similar to the noble gas abundance patterns of the old oceanic crust and sediment, which supports the model that the HIMU source originates from subducted oceanic crust and/or sediment. If the HIMU source corresponds to the oceanic crust which subducted at 1–2 Ga as suggested by Pb isotope studies, however, the characteristic 3He/ 4He of HIMU (6.8 R A) would be too high because radiogenic 4He produced by U and Th decay should dramatically decrease 3He/ 4He. To overcome this problem, the He open system model is introduced which includes the effects of 4He production and diffusion between the HIMU source material and the surrounding mantle. This model favors that the HIMU source resides in the upper mantle, rather than in the lower mantle. Furthermore, this model predicts the thickness of the HIMU source to be in the order of 1 km. In contrast to low and uniform 3He/ 4He character of HIMU, 3He/ 4He of EM are rather variable. Entrainment of upper mantle material and/or a less-degassed component are required to explain the observed 3He/ 4He of EM in the Polynesian area. Participation of the less-degassed component would be related to the “superplume” below the Polynesian region.