VESPER · Volcanoes: eruptive style, pre-eruptive evolution and risk

Volcanoes: eruptive style, pre-eruptive evolution and risk

‘The biggest eruptions tend to occur at volcanoes we know nothing about’ (1). The project studies when, why and how volcanoes erupt. We analyse volcanic deposits to understand pre-eruptive processes in deep magma reservoirs of active volcanoes in intra-plate- and subduction-related settings. The focus is on detailed description of whole-rock and mineral compositions. Our main interest is the mineral zircon that records information about magma source compositions, reservoir processes and crystallisation timescales. Zircon is chemically and physically resistant so can be recycled and register multiple events in the history of a volcano. The main objective is to understand periodicity and style of volcanic eruptions to mitigate hazards and risks to communities living near volcanoes - the past is the key to the future. Some 800 million people live within 100 km of an active volcano (2). Thus, the necessity to study, monitor and predict volcanic hazards becomes clear, particularly when we consider that risks to people living near volcanoes may arise from both immediate local- to regional-scale impacts and longer-term hemispheric- to global-scale effects. Understanding what determines whether a volcanic eruption is explosive or effusive is a key factor in hazard and risk assessment and mitigation planning. The overall objective of the project is to obtain information about magma storage conditions and plumbing systems in relation to effusive and explosive volcanic activity. Such information may be used to consider future volcanic behaviour and so short-term, within eruption, and longer-term, between eruption, potential risks. More specifically the project has three main objectives: i. To combine pre-existing hazard map and volcano-stratigraphic data that summarise the extent and style of deposits of known individual volcanic events with compositions of eruptive products. Knowing volcanoes past behaviour, and so how they may behave in the future, can be applied to hazard forecasting. ii. To track changes in magma composition recorded in whole-rocks and minerals to determine magma sources (mantle and crustal); identify possible proxies for pre-eruptive processes (melting, crystallisation, mixing and degassing); and, relate these to effusive or explosive eruptive volcanic deposits. iii. To determine the age of characterised volcanic samples, using U-series dating, and track zircons compositional changes in inherited, assimilated and magmatic crystals. 1. Oppenheimer 2011. Eruptions that shook the world 2. Loughlin et al., 2015. Global Volcanic Hazards and Risks

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