The Interface Between Magma and Earth's Atmosphere

Abstract

Volatiles released from magma can form bubbles and leave the magma body to eventually mix with atmospheric air. The composition of those volatiles, as derived from measurements made after their emission, is used to draw conclusions on processes in the Earth's interior or their influences on Earth's atmosphere. So far, the discussion of the influence of high-temperature mixing with atmospheric air (in particular oxygen) on the measured volcanic gas composition is almost exclusively based on thermodynamic equilibrium (TE) considerations. By modeling the combined effects of C-H-O-S reaction kinetics, turbulent mixing, and associated cooling during the first seconds after magmatic gas release into the atmosphere we show that the resulting gas compositions generally do not represent TE states, with individual species (e.g., CO, H2, H2S, OCS, SO3, HO2, H2O2) deviating by orders of magnitude from equilibrium levels. Besides revealing the chemical details of high-temperature emission processes, our results question common interpretations of volcanic gas studies, particularly affecting the present understanding of auto-catalytic conversion of volcanic halogen species in the atmosphere and redox state determination from volcanic plume gas measurements.