Experimentally based water budgets for dehydrating slabs and consequences for arc magma generation

Phase diagrams of hydrous mid-ocean ridge (MOR) basalts to 330 km depth and of hydrous peridotites to 250 km depth are compiled for conditions characteristic for subduction zones. A synthesis of our experimentally determined phase relations of chlorite, lawsonite, epidote-zoisite, amphibole, paragonite, chloritoid, talc, and phengite in basalts and of phase relations from the literature of serpentine, talc, chlorite, amphibole, and phase A in ultramafics permits calculation of H2O contents in hydrous phase assemblages that occur in natural compositions. This yields the information necessary to calculate water budgets for descending slabs. Starting from low-grade blueschist conditions (10–20 km depth) with H2O contents between 5 and 6 wt% for hydrated oceanic crust, complete dehydration is achieved between 70 and >300 km depth as a function of individual slab geotherms. Hydrous phases which decompose at depth below volcanic arcs are lawsonite, zoisite, chloritoid, and talc (š phengite) in mafic compositions and chlorite and serpentine in peridotite. Approximately 15–35% of the initially subducted H2O are released below volcanic arcs. The contribution of amphibole dehydration to the water budget is small (5–20%) and occurs at relatively shallow depth (65–90 km). In any predicted thermal structure, dehydration is a combination of a stepwise and a continuous process through many different reactions which occur simultaneously in the different portions of the descending slab. Such a dehydration characteristic is incompatible with ‘single phase dehydration models’ which focus fluid flow through a unique major dehydration event in order to explain volcanic fronts. As a consequence of continuously progressing dehydration, water ascending from the slab will be generally available to depth of ca. 150–200 km. The fluid rising from the subducting lithosphere will cause partial melting in the hot portion of the mantle wedge. We propose that the volcanic front simply forms above the mantle wedge isotherm where the extent of melting is sufficient to allow for the mechanical extraction of parental arc magmas. Thermal models show that such an isotherm (ca. 1300oC) locates below volcanic fronts, slab surface depths below such an isotherm are compatible with the observed depths of the slab surface below volcanic fronts.  1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.