The impacts of mantle phase transitions and the iron spin crossover in ferropericlase on convective mixing—is the evidence for compositional convection definitive? New results from a Yin‐Yang overset grid‐based control volume model

Abstract

AbstractHigh‐resolution seismic tomographic images from several subduction zones provide evidence for the inhibition of the downwelling of subducting slabs at the level of the 660 km depth seismic discontinuity. Furthermore, the inference of old (~140 Myr) sinking slabs below fossil subduction zones in the lower mantle has yet to be explained. We employ a control volume methodology to develop a new anelastically compressible model of three‐dimensional thermal convection in the “mantle” of a terrestrial planet that fully incorporates the influence of large variations in material properties. The model also incorporates the influence of (1) multiple solid‐solid pressure‐induced phase transitions, (2) transformational superplasticity at 660 km depth, and (3) the high spin‐low spin iron spin transition in ferropericlase at midmantle pressures. The message passing interface‐parallelized code is successfully tested against previously published benchmark results. The high‐resolution control volume models exhibit the same degree of radial layering as previously shown to be characteristic of otherwise identical 2‐D axisymmetric spherical models. The layering is enhanced by the presence of moderate transformational superplasticity, and in the presence of the spin crossover in ferropericlase, stagnation of cold downwellings occurs in the range of spin crossover depths (~1700 km). Although this electronic spin transition has been suggested to be invisible seismically, recent high‐pressure ab initio calculations suggest it to have a clear signature in body wave velocities which could provide an isochemical explanation of a seismological signature involving the onset of decorrelation between Vp and Vs that has come to be interpreted as requiring compositional layering.