Testing the x-eos in small peridotitic systems

Corinne Frigo has been visiting Melbourne from ANU. Corinne is working with Hugh O’Neill, Richard Arculus and Eleanor on ARC Discovery Project DP170100982, A new perspective on melting in the Earth and the origin of basalts. She has some very interesting experimental results on peridotite melting in CMAS + Cr2O3 + K2O at 30 kbar, which contrast nicely with the experiments of Liu & O’Neill (2004) at 11 kbar.

The experiments are giving the x-eos a workout! Currently, the model pyroxenes are taking too much Al2O3 in high-Cr2O3 bulk compositions, meaning that we should revise the Al-Cr partitioning here. Experiments in small systems are extremely useful, providing constraints that can’t be extracted from the natural system data available. Eleanor and Corinne will continue to look at this problem over the next few months, and their new insights will ultimately be incorporated into the next generation of igneous x-eos.