Reply to ‘Comment on “The beginnings of hydrous mantle wedge melting” by Till et al.’ by Green, Rosenthal and Kovacs

Abstract

The comment of Green et al. debates the interpretation of the temperature of the H2O-saturated peridotite solidus and presence of silicate melt in the experiments of Till et al. (Contrib Mineral Petrol 163:669–688, 2012) at <1,000 °C. The criticisms presented in their comment do not invalidate any of the most compelling observations of Till et al. (Contrib Mineral Petrol 163:669–688, 2012) as discussed in the following response, including the changing minor element and Mg# composition of the solid phases with increasing temperature in our experiments with 14.5 wt% H2O at 3.2 GPa, as well as the results of our chlorite peridotite melting experiments with 0.7 wt% H2O. The point remains that Till et al. (Contrib Mineral Petrol 163:669–688, 2012) present data that call into question the H2O-saturated peridotite solidus temperature preferred by Green (Tectonophysics 13(1–4):47–71, 1972; Earth Planet Sci Lett 19(1):37–53, 1973; Can Miner 14:255–268, 1976); Millhollen et al. (J Geol 82(5):575–587, 1974); Mengel and Green (Stability of amphibole and phlogopite in metasomatized peridotite under water-saturated and water-undersaturated conditions, Geological Society of Australia Special Publication, Blackwell, pp 571-581, 1989); Wallace and Green (Mineral Petrol 44:1–19, 1991) and Green et al. (Nature 467(7314):448–451, 2010).