Zhou Huaiyang

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Zhou
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Huaiyang
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  • Preprint
    Thin crust as evidence for an inherited mantle depletion supporting the Marion Rise
    ( 2012-12) Zhou, Huaiyang ; Dick, Henry J. B.
    The global ridge system is dominated by oceanic rises reflecting large variations in axial depth associated with mantle hotspots. The little studied Marion Rise is as large as the Icelandic, considering length and depth, but has an axial rift rather than a high nearly its entire length. Uniquely, along the SW Indian Ridge systematic sampling allows direct examination of crustal architecture over its full length. Unlike Iceland, peridotites are extensively exposed high over the rise. This shows for the 1st time that the crust is generally thin, and often missing over a rifted rise. Thus the rise must be largely an isostatic response to ancient melting events that created low-density depleted mantle beneath the ridge rather than thickened crust and/or a large thermal anomaly. The likely origin for the depleted mantle is that emplaced into the African asthenosphere during the Karoo and Madagascar flood basalt events.
  • Preprint
    Ocean rises are products of variable mantle composition, temperature and focused melting
    ( 2014-12) Dick, Henry J. B. ; Zhou, Huaiyang
    Ocean ridges, where Earth’s tectonic plates are pulled apart, vary from more than 5- km depth in the Arctic to 750 m above sea level in Iceland. This huge relief is generally attributed to mantle plumes underlying mantle hotspots, areas of enormous volcanism marked by ocean islands. The plumes are thought to feed the mantle beneath adjacent ocean ridges. This results in thickened crust and ridge elevation to form ocean rises. The composition of mid-ocean ridge basalt, a direct function of mantle composition and temperature, varies systematically up ocean rises, but in a unique way for each rise. Here we present thermodynamic calculations of melt-evolution pathways to show that variations in both mantle temperature and source composition are required to explain rise basalts. Thus, lateral gradients in mantle temperature cannot be uniquely determined from basalt chemistry, and ocean rises can be supported by chemically buoyant mantle and/or by robust mantle plumes. Our calculations also indicate that melt is conserved and focused by percolative flow towards the overlying ridge, progressively interacting with the mantle to shallow depth. We conclude that most mantle melting occurs by an overlooked mechanism, focused melting, whereas fractional melting is a secondary process that is important largely at shallow depth.
  • Article
    Jurassic zircons from the Southwest Indian Ridge
    (Nature Publishing Group, 2016-05-17) Cheng, Hao ; Zhou, Huaiyang ; Yang, Qunhui ; Zhang, Lingmin ; Ji, Fuwu ; Dick, Henry J. B.
    The existence of ancient rocks in present mid-ocean ridges have long been observed but received less attention. Here we report the discovery of zircons with both reasonably young ages of about 5 Ma and abnormally old ages of approximate 180 Ma from two evolved gabbroic rocks that were dredged from the Southwest Indian Ridge (SWIR) in the Gallieni fracture zone. U–Pb and Lu–Hf isotope analyses of zircons were made using ion probe and conventional laser abrasion directly in petrographic thin sections. Young zircons and their host oxide gabbro have positive Hf isotope compositions (εHf = +15.7–+12.4), suggesting a highly depleted mantle beneath the SWIR. The spread εHf values (from−2.3 to−4.5) of abnormally old zircons, together with the unradiogenic Nd-Hf isotope of the host quartz diorite, appears to suggest an ancient juvenile magmatism along the rifting margin of the southern Gondwana prior to the opening of the Indian Ocean. A convincing explanation for the origin of the unusually old zircons is yet to surface, however, an update of the theory of plate tectonics would be expected with continuing discovery of ancient rocks in the mid-oceanic ridges and abyssal ocean basins.
  • Article
    Silica-rich vein formation in an evolving stress field, Atlantis Bank Oceanic Core Complex
    (American Geophysical Union, 2020-06-14) Ma, Qiang ; Dick, Henry J. B. ; Urann, Benjamin M. ; Zhou, Huaiyang
    Drilling 809‐m Hole U1473A in the gabbro batholith at the Atlantis Bank Oceanic Core Complex (OCC) found two felsic vein generations: late magmatic fractionates, rich in deuteric water, hosted by oxide gabbros, and anatectic veins associated with dike intrusion and introduction of seawater‐derived volatiles. Microtextures show a change from compressional to tensional stress during vein formation. Temperatures and oxidation state were obtained from amphibole‐plagioclase and oxide pairs in the adjacent gabbros. Type I veins generally have reverse shear‐sense, with restricted ΔFMQ, high Mt/Ilm ratios, and low‐amphibole Cl/F indicating deuteric fluids. They formed during percolation and fractionation of Fe‐Ti‐rich melts into the primary olivine gabbro. Type II veins are usually hosted by olivine gabbro, occur at dike contacts and the margins of normal‐sense shear zones. They are undeformed or weakly deformed, with highly variable ΔFMQ, low Mt/Ilm ratios, and high‐amphibole Cl/F, indicating seawater‐derived fluids. The detachment fault on which the gabbro massif was emplaced rooted near the base of the dike‐gabbro transition beneath the rift valley. The ingress of seawater volatiles began at >800°C and penetrated at least ~590 m into the lower crust during extensional faulting in the rift valley and adjacent rift mountains. The sequence of the felsic vein formation likely reflects asymmetric diapiric flow, with a reversal of the stress regime, and a transition from juvenile to seawater‐derived volatiles. This, in turn, is consistent with fault capture leading to the large asymmetries in spreading rates during OCC formations and heat flow beneath the rift mountains.