Hydrogen in the upper mantle: Diffusion and effects on olivine transformation kinetics

Olivine is the most abundant mineral in Earth's upper mantle and can host significant amounts of hydrogen within its crystal structure. The presence of hydrogen affects many of olivine's physical properties such as electrical conductivity, viscosity, sound speed, transformation kinetics, phase equilibrium, and generally speaking the physics governing the interior of the earth. Understanding how hydrogen affects olivine is integral to understanding the Earth's interior. In this work olivine was experimentally hydrated and reacted at high pressure and temperature, to simulate upper mantle conditions. The physical properties measured in this work are used to understand seismic and magnetotelluric observations of the Earth.;In the first project the effects of hydrogen on olivine transformation kinetics were examined. Growth rates for olivine's high pressure polymorphs, wadsleyite and ringwoodite, to determine if olivine can persist metastably inside cold subducting slabs in the mantle transition zone. Hydrogen significantly enhances the growth rates of olivine into ringwoodite. For olivine containing ∼75 (or higher) ppmw H2O At 18 GPa and 900°C the growth rate for ringwoodite rims is 1.0x10-9 m/s with activation enthalpy of 235 +/- 30 kJ/mol, which is too high for persistence of metastable olivine into the transition zone. Confirmation of the existence of metastable olivine by seismologists would constrain H2O contents at such locations to be < 75 ppmw H2O.;In the second project deuterium-hydrogen interdiffusion coefficients were measured to help understand electrical conductivity, point defect populations, chemical transport, and defect dominated properties in olivine. For the fastest H-diffusing [100] orientation DD-H, [100] = 10(-5.04 +/- 1.43)*e(-137 +/- 31 kJ/mol)/(RT) m²/s at 2 GPa and 750--900°C. Comparison of DD-H to chemical diffusion coefficients allows us to calculate diffusivity of intrinsic defects. Olivine electrical conductivity is calculated from DD-H using the Nernst-Einstein relation. These results combined with geophysical electrical conductivity depth profiles permit first order calculations of H2O contents in the upper mantle and suggest that the hydrogen contribution to electrical conductivity is too small to account for high electrical conductivity anomalies in the asthenosphere.