Geology topics

E. D. Jackson

Publications and source records attributed to E. D. Jackson.

4 recordsLinked to original sources

USGS1975

The vourinos ophiolite, Greece: Cyclic units of lineated cumulates overlying harzburgite tectonite

Re-examination of the Vourinos ophiolite shows it to be composed of metamorphic tectonites, cumulates, plagiogranites, dikes, and lava. The contact between the tectonites and the cumulates is exposed and sharp. Beneath the cumulate contact, the rocks have been highly deformed and complexly folded; above that contact, they simply have been tilted vertically to expose a stratiform complex 1,500 m (4,800 ft) thick. The stratiform intrusion is characterized by cyclic units, rich in olivine at the base, and rich in feldspar at the top. Some cumulus diorites are present at the top of the section which grade into quartz diorites (plagiogranites) with hypautomorphic textures. Lineate lamination characterizes the cumulates and may indicate the direction or orientation of the Mesozoic mid-oceanic ridge crest with respect to the present position of the complex. A siliceous dike swarm cuts the upper part of the stratiform complex. The section suggests that in the case of Vourinos, a large magmatic chamber formed at a mid-oceanic ridge crest and that intrusion was a much more important process than extrusion in the formation of oceanic crust in that area. The reported presence of cumulates in many other ophiolite complexes suggests that these relations may obtain generally at most or all spreading ridges. The contact between the tectonites and the cumulates of the complex would not have corresponded with seismic M. © 1975 Geological Society of America.

Geological Society of America Bulletin↗

USGS1975

Structure and petrology of a cumulus norite boulder sampled by Apollo 17 in Taurus-Littrow Valley, the Moon

A glass-coated half-meter-size boulder was sampled by the Apollo 17 crew at station 8 near the foot of the Sculptured Hills. The rock proved to be a coarse-grained (0.5-cm) plagioclase-orthopyroxene cumulate, and the samples are the only true norites returned from the lunar surface. Photographs of the boulder showed it to contain at least nine structural surfaces and four glass veins. Orientation and inspection of three of the returned samples resulted in the identification of six surfaces and one vein. One of the structural surfaces visible in the boulder was identified as primary cumulus planar lamination, which was folded through an angle of at least 35° between two oriented samples, whereas fracture sets representing the other surfaces were coincident. The boulder is believed to be a sample of the deeper highlands or submare lunar crust, derived from a depth of 8 to 30 km and somewhat shock-metamorphosed during at least two excavation events. The chemical composition of the norites, when determined, should be of special interest in view of the large amount of literature concerning glass, cataclasite, hornfels, and "basalt" of noritic composition returned by other Apollo missions. However, the cumulus texture of the boulder precludes its being representative of any magmatic liquid composition, suggests that the lunar crust is heterogeneously layered, and that plagioclase sank, not floated, in magmatic liquids that formed the lunar crust. © 1975 Geological Society of America.

Geological Society of America Bulletin↗

USGS1974

Contributions to the petrography and geochronology of volcanic rocks from the leeward Hawaiian Islands

Petrographic and chemical analyses of basalt from Nihoa Island, Necker Island, French Frigate Shoals, and Midway Atoll, all in the leeward part of the Hawaiian chain, confirm that these islands are subaerial remnants of tholeiitic shield volcanoes similar to those that form the principal Hawaiian Islands. Chemistry suggests that Gardner Pinnacles may be part of the alkalic cap on a tholeiitic shield. Weighted mean potassium-argon ages of 7.0 ± 0.3 m.y. for Nihoa, 10.0 ± 0.4 m.y. for Necker, 11.7 ± 0.4 m.y. for French Frigate, and 17.9 ± 0.6 m.y. for Midway demonstrate that the ages of these volcanoes increase northwestward, continuing the trend of increasing age away from the active volcano of Kilauea shown by the main islands. The increase in age with distance along the chain, however, appears to be nonlinear. The results support the general hypothesis that the volcanoes of the Hawaiian chain have a common origin and were formed as the Pacific plate moved northwestward over a melting spot in the mantle.

Hawaii↗

USGSDate not supplied

Xenoliths in the honolulu volcanic series, Hawaii

The Pleistocene to Holocene Honolulu Volcanic Series was erupted from about 37 vents scattered over the older Koolau tholeiite shield. The rocks of this series are compositionally zoned with respect to the shield; near the Koolau caldera the predominant rocks are melilitenepheline basalts, but these give way outward to nepheline basalts, and ultimately, at the apron of the shield, to alkalic olivine basalts. The xenoliths in these are likewise zoned: most of those in the caldera area consist of dunite, most of those at intermediate distances of lherzolite, and some of those in the apron of the shield consist of garnet pyroxenite and peridotite. The zoning of the xenoliths, however, does not coincide with that of the enclosing rocks. We believe that copious eruption of Koolau tholeiite produced a lateral and vertical heterogeneity in the mantle beneath Oahu, and that the zoning in both Honolulu lavas and their xenoliths is caused by that heterogeneity. The textures of the xenoliths indicate that the basalts were mainly produced by fractional melting rather than fractional crystallization. There is some evidence that the dunite xenoliths are mantle residua produced during the generation of the tholeiite, and that the Honolulu magmas were generated at greater depths than the Koolau magmas, probably as a result of elastic unloading. © 1970 Oxford University Press.

Hawaii↗