Alexander N Halliday Collegiate Professor of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Professor
About
Research Interests
In recent years, my research interests have been focused on high-pressure and high-temperature phase-equilibrium experiments to calibrate various mineral-melt thermometers, hygrometers, and barometers. These include the plagioclase-liquid thermometer/hygrometer and the olivine-melt thermometer/hygrometer (see available spreadsheet models below), and current efforts are focused on the partitioning of Ti between biotite and melt and quartz and melt (in equilibrium with ilmenite and titanomagnetite). My research group also measures the density, thermal expansion and compressibility (via sound speed measurements) of multicomponent silicate and carbonate liquids, with compositions relevant to magmatic systems. Other interests include: (i) redox equilibria in magmatic systems and the role of magmatic degassing, (ii) evidence that most phenocryst growth in erupted magmas occurs during ascent, and (iii) the origin of voluminous high-SiO2 rhyolite (how it efficiently segregates and accumulates) and why it is a sparse magma type at subduction zones and instead is largely found in regions of continental extension (often bimodally with basalt).
Click here for the plagioclase-liquid hygrometer of Waters and Lange (2015).
Click here for the olivine-liquid thermometer/hygrometer of Pu et al. (2017, 2021).
Fields of Study
- Experimental petrology
- Thermodynamic properties of silicate and carbonate liquids
- Subduction zone magmatism and volcanism
- High-SiO2 rhyolites
