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Fractional crystallization in silicate melts (magmas) is a very complex process compared to chemical systems in the laboratory because it is affected by a wide variety of phenomena. Prime amongst these are the composition, temperature, and pressure of a magma during its cooling.
Schematic diagrams showing the principles behind fractional crystallisation in a magma. While cooling, the magma evolves in composition because different minerals crystallize from the melt. 1: olivine crystallizes; 2: olivine and pyroxene crystallize; 3: pyroxene and plagioclase crystallize; 4: plagioclase crystallizes.
Magma that is extruded onto the surface during a volcanic eruption is called lava. Lava cools and solidifies relatively quickly compared to underground bodies of magma. This fast cooling does not allow crystals to grow large, and a part of the melt does not crystallize at all, becoming glass.
Porphyritic texture develops when the larger crystals, called phenocrysts, grow to considerable size before the main mass of the magma crystallizes as finer-grained, uniform material called groundmass. Grain size in igneous rocks results from cooling time so porphyritic rocks are created when the magma has two distinct phases of cooling. [18]
Within the field of geology, Bowen's reaction series is the work of the Canadian petrologist Norman L. Bowen, [1] who summarized, based on experiments and observations of natural rocks, the sequence of crystallization of common silicate minerals from typical basaltic magma undergoing fractional crystallization (i.e. crystallization wherein early-formed crystals are removed from the magma by ...
Porphyritic textures develop when conditions during the cooling of magma change relatively quickly. The earlier formed minerals will have formed slowly and remain as large crystals, whereas, sudden cooling causes the rapid crystallization of the remainder of the melt into a fine-grained (aphanitic) matrix.
Afterwards, a new liquid corresponding to the residual liquid from the previous step is synthesized, heated, and then subjected to another cooling step. The purpose of this stepwise approach is to examine how each new interval of crystallization affects the chemistry of the parent magma and, thus, the behavior of future crystallization steps.
Then as the magma crystallizes, volatiles such as water, carbon dioxide and sulfur dioxide increase in concentration in the liquid phase of the magma. [1] Eventually, at a very late stage of crystallization, the volatile concentration becomes so great that a separate hydrothermal fluid phase separated from the silicate magma. [1]