Copious, Long-lived Rejuvenated Volcanism in the Northern Hawaiian Islands

Abstract:

New marine surveying and submersible sampling of Kaul‘a Volcano, located 100 km off the axis of the Hawaiian Chain, have revealed widespread areas of young volcanism. New ⁴⁰Ar/³⁹Ar and geochemical analyses of the olivine-phyric submarine and subaerial volcanic rocks show that Kaul‘a is shrouded with young alkalic basalts (1.9 to 0.5 Ma). The ages and chemistry of these rocks overlap with rejuvenated lavas from nearby shields Ni‘ihau, Kaua‘i and South Kaua‘i Swell. Collectively, rejuvenated lavas cover a vast area (~7000 km²) in the northern Hawaiian Islands. Kaul‘a rejuvenated lavas show a much larger (5x) variation of incompatible elements than those from adjacent Ni‘ihau but comparable to Honolulu rejuvenated lavas. Unlike both suites, heavy REE elements in Kaul‘a lavas are pinned at Yb_n 10, indicating a strong garnet signature in the source. Rejuvenated lavas from the Kaua‘i Ridge have slightly higher radiogenic Pb isotope ratios than those from the southern Hawaiian Islands (Maui to O‘ahu) and partly straddle the LOA-KEA boundary. Rejuvenated volcanism was nearly coeval occurrence from ~0.3 to 0.6 Ma along a 450 km segment of the Hawaiian Islands (West Maui to north of Ni‘ihau), which is inconsistent with most models for rejuvenated volcanism except the Ballmer et al.² dynamic melting model. This model invokes increasing pyroxenite contributions and the interaction with scale-scale convection rolls in the lithosphere to enhance the volume and duration of rejuvenation volcanism. Thus, a pyroxenite-bearing, mixed Kea-Loa source component may have contributed to the prolonged and extensive rejuvenated volcanism in the northern Hawaiian Islands.

¹Robinson & Eakins 2006, J. Vol. Geotherm. Res., 151, 309-317; ²Ballmer et al. 2011, Nat. Geosc. 4, 457–460.