Knowledge of the isotopic evolution of volcanic eruptions is essential to volcanologists, geochemists, and paleoclimatologists. I isotopically evaluate the evolution of magmas from their initial formation, to eruption, and then to their alteration during the diffusion of environmental waters into volcanic glass. I focus first on the formation and evolution of large, caldera-forming eruptions from both Gorely volcano in Kamchatka, Russia and 30–40 Ma caldera forming eruptions through Oregon in the United States of America. I utilize oxygen (δ18O), hafnium (εHf), strontium (87Sr/86Sr), and neodymium (143Nd/144Nd) isotopes to document the creation of caldera-forming eruptions at these eruptive centers through the melting of surrounding crust. I also use U-Pb and 40Ar/39Ar to document the timescales of the formation of these large-volume silicic eruptions. Following eruption, the volcanic glass in tephra and ash can slowly take in environmental water. It is thought that the hydrogen isotopic ratio (δD) of these waters can be used to determine paleoenvironments from the time that the volcanic glass was deposited. The latter portion of my dissertation focuses on the use of hydrogen isotopes of environmentally hydrated volcanic glass to determine paleoenvironments, and the calibration of the TCEA to analyze oxygen isotopes of hydrated volcanic glass. I first focus on the rate of diffusion of water at ambient temperature to better understand the time frame necessary to hydrate volcanic glass for use as a paleoenvironmental indicator. I also document the hydrogen isotopic ratios that result from the diffusion of water into volcanic glass, which is documented as a decrease in δD with an increase in secondary hydration in all regions worldwide except equatorial. Finally, I focus on the earliest stages of diffusion of water into volcanic glass by analyzing tephra deposits that were collected within days of the 1980 eruptions of Mount St. Helens as well as tephra deposits recently collected in 2015 to identify changes in water concentration and hydrogen isotopic ratios over an ~35 year period.

I describe an experimental apparatus used to perform deformation experiments relevant to volcanology. The apparatus supports low-load, high-temperature deformation experiments under dry and wet conditions on natural and synthetic samples. The experiments recover the transient rheology of complex (melt ± porosity ± solids) volcanic materials during uniaxial deformation. The key component to this apparatus is a steel cell designed for high-temperature deformation experiments under controlled water pressure. Experiments are run under constant displacement rates or constant loads; the range of accessible experimental conditions include: 25 - 1100 °C, load stresses 0 to 150 MPa, strain rates 10⁻⁶ to 10⁻² s⁻¹, and fluid pressures 0-150 MPa. I present a suite of high-temperature, uniaxial deformation experiments performed on 25 by 50 mm unjacketed cores of porous Φ∼0.8) sintered rhyolitic ash. The experiments were performed at, both, atmospheric (dry) and elevated water pressure conditions (wet). Dry experiments were conducted mainly at 900 °C, but also included a suite of lower temperature experiments at 850, 800 and 750 °C. Wet experiments were performed at ∼650 °C under water pressures of 1, 2.5, 3, and 5 MPa, and at a fixed PH2O of ∼2.5 MPa for temperatures of ∼385, 450, and 550 °C. During deformation, strain is manifest by shortening of the cores, reduction of porosity, flattening of ash particles, and radial bulging of the cores. The continuous reduction of porosity leads to a dynamic transient strain-dependent rheology and requires strain to be partitioned between a volume (porosity loss) and a shear (radial bulging) component. The effect of increasing porosity is to expand the window for viscous deformation for dry melts by delaying the onset of brittle deformation by ∼50 °C (875 °C to 825 °C). The effect is more pronounced in hydrous melts (∼0.67 — 0.78 wt. % H₂0) where the viscous to brittle transition is depressed by ∼140 to 150 °C. Increasing water pressure also delays the onset of strain hardening due to compaction-driven porosity reduction. These rheological data are pertinent to volcanic processes where high-temperature porous magmas I liquids are encountered (e.g., magma flow in conduits, welding of pyroclastic materials). / Science, Faculty of / Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Sciences, Department of / Graduate

The Bayuda monogenetic volcanic field (BMVF) is an active, understudied Holocene volcanic field located in the great bend of the Nile, Sudan. The BMVF’s location provides an excellent opportunity to study monogenetic volcanism in an African context. Recent studies have shown that monogenetic volcanoes can have more intricate plumbing systems than initially thought. The project sets out to provide a general description and genesis of the BMVF emphasising the plumbing system. Petrography reveals olivine and clinopyroxene as the main phenocryst phases in a groundmass of predominantly plagioclase and subordinate pyroxene and olivine microcrysts. A significant amount of crystals display pronounced disequilibrium textures alongside sector and oscillatory zoning. Major and trace elements indicate that the BMVF is sodic-alkaline, resembling an OIB signature. Melting models that use partitioning coefficients of Zr, Hf and Nb in phenocrysts estimate 2-4% melting of a metasomatised garnet pyroxenite at a depth of ~2.8GPa as the source melt for the BMVF. The isotopic signature suggests mixing of an enriched mantle component (HIMU) and a depleted mantle component (DMM). Textural evidence alongside KD (Fe-Mg) of olivine indicate open system dynamics by revealing separate magma batches with differing times and depths of emplacement. Ni, Ca and Mn content of olivine, furthers the idea of open system dynamics by revealing processes of 1) ‘failed eruptions’, 2) magma mixing and 3) deep-seated fractionation. This project forms part of a growing number of studies that suggest complex plumbing system for monogenetic volcanic fields. / Dissertation (MSc)--University of Pretoria, 2020. / Geology / MSc / Unrestricted

The Glass Buttes volcanic complex consists of many domes and individual vents that erupted both rhyolitic and basaltic lavas during the late Miocene to early Pliocene. The east half of the complex, in the vicinity of Little Glass Butte, contains interfingering, finely flow-banded rhyolite and black obsidian flows. The youngest unit, an obsidian, has been dated at 4.9 m.y. East of Little Glass Butte lie two northwest-trending ridges, Antelope and Cascade Ridges, composed of two or more overlapping exogenous domes that formed along northwest-trending faults.

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