Geol Week 5 Lecture Powerpoint notes

Ways to form igneous rocks?

- Crystalize from melted rock (magma
- Precipitation from a solution
- Solid state diffusion - reorganization of atoms
- Biomineralization - created by biological processes
- Fumoric process - volcanic gases that create sulphor crystals

What is the heat source for melting?

- Radioactive decay of elements inside earth is the vast majority in terms of
cause of the melting process.
- Gravitational energy, which turned to heat during earth formation
- Meteorite impacts
- Tidal heating
- Formation of Earth's core - when liquid outer core cools enough to
crystalize the inner core, it provides
latent heat elsewhere.
- Remember convectional processes of the uprising of hot materials and
hotspots

- Lava vs MAGMA -
MAGMA - is underground
q LAVA - is on the surface
Lava emerges to surface via VOLCANO

- Melted material can cool above OR below ground - obviously things cool more
quickly on the surface than under
ground, because rocks are good insulators of heat.
- EXTRUSIVE - rocks that have reached the surface to flow out cooled by
air or water
( Lava Flows - the streams or mounds of cooled melt)
(PYROCLASTIC debris - cooled fragments)
- - INTRUSIVE rocks cool slowly underground and there are more intrusive
than extrusive igneous rocks
- It sometimes intrudes into preexisting wall rock into
columns/sheets
- To understand Igneous rocks we have to understand chemistry and
composition, and texture
- Geochemistry can determine things like dating of rocks and melts, or
identifying prehistoric trade
in the middle east, detected the fire pit tools and dinner.
- Dark rock indicates high iron content, lighter rock is more silica
based.

- BOWEN's REACTION SERIES **IMPORTANT TO KNOW**

- N L Bowen devised experiments of rock melts to determine the order of
which certain minerals crystalize
- He discovered that minerals solidify in a specific series.
- CONTINUOUS - Called continuous because you can't
differentiate differences
Plagioclase changed from Ca-rich to Na-rich
- DISCONTINUOUS - Every step is distinctly separate
minerals.
Minerals start and stop crystalizing
- Olivine > Pyroxene > Amphibole > Biotite >
K=Feldspar > Muscovite > Quartz
(Augite is the common Pyroxene mineral) (Hornblende
is a name of Amphibole)
 - Those with higher melting point were the first to crystalize
and those with lower melting point
crystalize last.
- We will be expected to identify the hotter and cooler side of
this Bowen Series, not exact.
- Identify Ultramafic and Mafic, Intermediate, and Felsic, from
iron based to silica based
and the mix inbetween.
- NEED TO KNOW FOR TEST: - CONTINENTAL CRUST is Felsic
- OCEANIC CRUST is MAFIC
- MANTLE is ULTRAMAFIC
- ARC VOLCANOES are INTERMEDIATE
- Iron rich ----> silica rich
Hot ----------> colder
less viscous -> more viscous
more volatiles > less explosive
- More felsic minerals always melt first, so magmas always more silicic
than the residual rock.
- More iron based parts tend to sink deeper.
- PARTIAL MELTING
- The melting of the lowest melting point minerals first, while higher
melting point minerals remain
solid, SEPARATION of the melt from the remaining solid allows
DIFFERENTIATION (silica differentiate
from iron rich minerals)
- Earth is mostly solid rock, so what causes localized melting?
- Melting point DEPRESSION - melting point ofrock lowers, with
the addition of volatiles.
like a gas, water, or carbon dioxide. As subduction
occurs it drags down volatiles
- DECOMPRESSION MELTING at hotspots and mid ocean ridges. We know
with greater depth comes
hotter temperatures which is the geothermal gradient, and
decompression melting occurs when hot
solid mantle rock ascends moving into regions of lower pressure.
When melting is accompanied by
an increase in volume, or it occurs at progressively higher
temperatures with increased depth.
This is because of the steady increase in confining pressure by
the weight of overlying rocks.
So reducing confining pressure lowers a rocks melting point.

-APHANITIC TEXTURES - fine grained oceanic igneous rock

-rapid cooling
- crystals do not have a lot of time to grow
- extrusive (volcanic)
- PORPHYRITIC TEXTURES - a mixture of coarse and fine crystals
- has a two stage cooling history
- initial slow cooling creates large phenocrysts
- subsequent eruption cools remaining magma more rapidly

- SUMMARY -
- For Igneous rocks with interlocking crystals:
-The slower it cools, the bigger the crystals
- If you can easily see all the crystals, it is Phaneritic
- If you cannot easily make out the indiidual crystals with the
naked eye it is aphanitic
- If there is a combination of big and small crystals it is
Porphyritic
 - The two sizes represents a multi stage cooling
history
- slow cooling makes the big crystals
- Fast cooling makes the small crystals (volcanic)
- the small crystals are often the most numerous and
are sometimes called the
matrix.
- Pyroclastic TEXTURES = refers to volcanic rocks which were formed by the
eruption event
- Igneous rocks with this teture are often composed of the "debris"
from eruption.
- VOLCANIC BRECCIA - when you have a pre existing rock that was
shattered byeruption and
after the pieces fall and are cemented together.
-Generally these textures are made of pieces of lava, and the bits of
lava that cool in the AIR and rain
down, which is called TEPHRA.
- Tephra is defined by size. Varies from the size of a building
to that of ash.
- The color will vary based on the composition of the
material,
sillica - lighter, iron - darker
-Vesicular textures - Forms the same way as pyroclastic except these have
pockets of gas that make them lighter.
Examples: Pumics and Scoria, Pumics floats, and Scoria sinks because it
has iron and is denser.
- GLASSY texture - it forms when lava cools so quickly it flash freezes, the
molecules cant organize themselves
into rocky form. Obsidian is a good example and broken edges can be
extremely sharp.

LAVA, MAGMA, AND STRUCTURES

- MELT MOVEMENT - Why Does Magma Rise?
- It is less dense than surrounding rocks. Buoyancy forces act to drive
magma upward
- The weight of overlying rock creates pressure and it squeezes magma
upward like mud bewteen toes.
- Speed of magma depends on VISCOSITY - measures resistance to flow.
- Lower viscosity flows more easily (warm honey)
- Higher viscosity does not flow as easily (cold honey)
- Magma Viscosity depends on: Silica SiO2 content, or the lower the
silica content, the lower the viscosity
It;s because of long bonds or chains of silica that create a
slower moving web.
- Temperature - Hotter Temp = lower viscosity :: more expansive,
more energy within it and
molecules will want to slide past each other.
- Volatile content - Higher volatile content = lower viscosity.
The gases that move around that hit
silica chains and break them to make the movement occur
easier.
- FELSIC LAVA is the most viscousbecause it has a very high
silica content
- often has a lower temp than mafic lava
- generally lower volatile content, less volatiles on
continents
-MAFIC LAVA is the opposite, it involves more volatiles because
its involved with ocean subductions
-EXPLOSIVITIY - Trapped volatiles increaes the explosivity of the
lava.
- GENTLE ERUPTION - no explosivity where lava just oozes to the
surface.
- Explosive eruption - explosive volcanic activity with
pyroclastic flow at damaging distances
-EXTRUSIVE VOLCANIC FLOWS
- Extrusive settings : lava flows
- Eruption style depends on viscosity of melt
- lava flows cool as blankets that stack vertically
- Lava flows exit volcanic vents and spread outward
- low viscosity lava (basalt) can flow long distances
- high viscosity lava piles into mounds of angular
blocks
- Explosions: pyroclastic flow are hot ash and gas that travel
hundreds miles an hour
and are extremely dangerous.
` `` - Intrusive flows - TABULAR INTRUSIONS
- Walls that are called DIKES - or igneoous
rocks that
cut across pre existing layers vertically
- Floors known as SILLs that are injected
parallel to other rock layers
horizontally.
SILL FORMATION - they just push in between layers of
rock enough to change
local topography.
- DIKE FORMATION - push through vertically from
underneath.
- BLISTER SHAPED INTRUSIONS - when magma injects into
a layer but gets blocked
and forms a pooled blister shape
- Laccolith - a blister with a rounded top
(more common)
- lapolith - is U shaped, convex downward.
- VOLCANIC NECK - When lava comes to the surface
through vents, the central
vent of a volcano can become plugged up with
hardened lava.
Necks can be stronger than surrounding rocks,
and over time the volcano
may erode away leaving only the neck.
- VOLCANIC PIPE - when deep magma rushes to the
surface at supersonic speed
throgh a crack in the crust it can rip apart
the rock walls and may
include brccia and diamonds.
- PLUTONS are blob shaped intrusions (magma chambers)
ranging in size from
meters to kilometers
- BATHOLITHS are groups of plutons, several hundred
kilometers long, the sierra
nevada range is an exposed batholith.
- VOLCANOES
- A volcano is a mountain built by extrusive igneuous activity, active,
dormant, or extinct.
- Gas content and silica content determines the explosivity of a
volcano as well as the viscosity.
- ARCHITECTURE of a volcano includes: Magma chamber, Fissures/vents,
Craters, Calderas, distinctive
 profiles (Shield volcanoes, cinder cones, and stratovolcano)
-Determining the two types of volcano is looking at the size and
steepness of the size.
- You can tell the rock type of volcanes depending on their shape
- A SHIELD volcano will have basaltic flow with its low viscosity
(largest)
They're very broad with a slight dome shape, laterally
constructed.
- A Composite cone/stratovolcano - will have andesite with its
viscosity (intermediate)
- Large cone shaped volcanoes with steep slopes, with
alternating layers of lava,
debris, and tephra. They're symmetrical and become
odd shaped from landslides
(My fuji, rainier, vesuvius) Mostly composed of
andesite, with an intermediate
composition, and fine grained. It's high in silica
content making it very
viscous making cone shapes more easily formed.
- CINDER cones have a Rhyolitic dome has lava so viscous that
will just pile up on itself
with the steepest sides. (smallest) Conical piles of tephra
(pyroclastic material)
- lower viscosity has higher chance of lateral flow.
-