Active lava lakes present a rare opportunity to observe directly the complex processes occurring within a magma body. Situated on Ross Island, Antarctica, the 3794-m-high crater of Erebus volcano has hosted a phonolite lava lake for decades. Previous studies have shown that many of the lake’s characteristics, such as surface velocity, gas flux and gas composition, exhibit a pronounced pulsatory behaviour on a time-scale of ∼10 min. Focusing primarily on the analysis of infra-red (IR) imagery acquired from the crater rim, this dissertation considers how the periodic behaviour of the Erebus lava lake evolves over decadal time periods, how the cyclic fluctuations of the different properties are interrelated and what can be inferred about the mechanisms occurring beneath the surface of the lake from these observations. Creation of new hardware, software and methodologies to facilitate these types of observations is a strong focus of this work. Chapter 1 introduces the nature of active lava lakes, reviews previous studies of Erebus and presents in detail the research objectives that are addressed by the subsequent chapters. In Chapter 2, a new thermal camera system that was developed as part of this study is described. Designed to run autonomously at the crater-rim of Erebus, this system was installed in December 2012 and has enabled, for the first time, extended time-series of images to be acquired. Chapter 3 briefly describes some of the other hardware and software that was developed as part of this study and outlines how it has been utilised for volcano monitoring. In Chapter 4, a dataset of IR images collected between 2004–2011 is used to assess inter-annual variability in the pulsatory behaviour of the surface motion of the Erebus lava lake. The cyclic behaviour is found to be a sustained feature of the lake, and no obvious changes are observed across the time period analysed. Data collected with the camera system described in Chapter 2 are analysed in Chapter 5 and combined with measurements from other instruments to assess the correlation between the cyclic behaviours of different lake properties. Cycles in surface speed, surface elevation, gas flux and gas composition are found to be highly correlated with each other. In Chapter 6, the surface velocities calculated in the preceding chapters are revisited, and the two-dimensional structure of the flow field is analysed. Chapter 7 demonstrates how the motion tracking methodologies developed for studying the Erebus lava lake can be used to improve high time resolution sulphur dioxide flux estimates - a significant challenge faced in the study presented in Chapter 5. Finally, Chapter 8 presents a synthesis of the key findings and conclusions from the preceding chapters.

Paterae (volcano-tectonic depressions) are among the most prominent topographic features on Io. They are unique, yet in some aspects they resemble calderas known and studied on Earth, Mars, and Venus. They have steep walls, flat floors, and arcuate margins, typical of terrestrial and Martian basalt shield calderas. However, they are much larger (2 km - 202 km diameter, mean 42 km 3 km) and typically lack obvious shields. They are often angular in shape or are found adjacent to mountains, suggesting tectonic influences on their formation. A preferential clustering of paterae at the equatorial sub- and anti-jovian regions is likely a surface expression of tidal massaging and convection in the asthenosphere. Paterae adjacent to mountains have a mean diameter 14 km 9 km larger than that for all paterae, which may indicate paterae grow larger in the fractured crust near mountains. Nightside and eclipse observations of Pele Patera by the Cassini and Galileo spacecraft reveal that much of Pele’s visible thermal emission comes from lava fountains within a topographically confined lava body, most likely a lava lake. Multiple filter images provided color temperatures of 1500 80 K from Cassini ISS data, and 1420 100 K from Galileo SSI data. Hotspots found within paterae (79% of all hotspots) exhibit a wide range of thermal behaviors in global eclipse images. Some hotspots are similar to Pele, consistently bright and confined; others, such as Loki, brighten or dim between observations and move to different locations within their patera. A model for patera formation begins with heating and convection within a high-temperature, low-viscosity asthenosphere. Magma rises through the cold, dense lithosphere either as diapirs [for thermal softening of the lithosphere and sufficiently large diapirs (20 km - 40 km diameter, >5 km thickness)] or through dikes. Magma reaches zones of neutral buoyancy and forms magma chambers that feed eruptions. Collapse over high-level chambers results in patera formation, filling of the patera with lava to create a lava lake, or lateral spreading of the magma chamber and subsequent enlargement of the patera by consuming crustal materials.

The first part of this thesis investigates the mixing of ambient fluid into axisymmetric high Reynolds number gravity currents. A series of laboratory experiments were conducted in which small scale gravity currents travelled along a wedge shaped channel with an increasing width in the downstream direction. The channel was filled with fresh water and the current was generated using saline solution introduced either by a rapid release of a known finite volume from behind a lock gate or by pumping at a constant rate into the apex of the channel. The distribution and evolution of the density of the flow with distance downstream was measured using a light attenuation technique. Additional experiments were performed by injecting parcels of dye in different regions of the flow in order to visualise the motion of fluid in and surrounding the gravity current. Unlike currents introduced by the release of a finite volume of fluid, where most mixing occurs in the head of the flow, currents produced from a steady source develop a steady tail region behind the front which is also found to entrain a significant amount of ambient fluid. In both types of current, we estimate the fraction of displaced ambient fluid that is entrained into the flow. We then derive a new class of self-similar solutions for gravity currents produced from a finite volume release of fluid. The second part of this thesis develops the experimental method of measuring mixing using light attenuation to investigate the mixing of liquid in a vertical conduit which results from a continuous stream of high Reynolds number gas bubbles. The experiments identify that the mixing in the wake of the bubbles leads to a net dispersive transport along the conduit. The process provides an explanation for the heat transfer within a volcanic conduit in the case of a gas-slug flow regime as occurs in the near surface region of volcanic conduits connected to surface lava lakes. We derive a theoretical model to estimate the heat flux associated with such a system using the empirical law for the dispersive mixing. The predicted heat flux associated with the bubbles is found to be comparable to the heat loss at the surface of lava lakes associated with radiative and convective heat loss. Given values for the gas flux, the lake area and the temperature at the surface of the lake, the model enables new predictions for the size of the volcanic conduit.