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Two-pyroxene thermobarometry with new experimental data in the system CaO-MgO-Al2O3-SiO2

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Abstract

In the system CaO-MgO-Al2O3-SiO2 (CMAS), equilibrium alumina contents of orthopyroxene and clinopyroxene, both coexisting with spinel + forsterite or spinel + anorthite, have been reversed in 16 runs at 1,300–1,400°C and 10.2–20.8 kbar, using PbO flux. The present data and the data of Perkins and Newton (1980) have been modeled using the Redlich-Kister equation. The resulting model satisfies most of the reversed data in the CMAS system, agrees very well with thermochemical measurements, and is consistent with the model for the enstatite-diopside join of Lindsley et al. (1981) and with the system MgO-Al2O3-SiO2 of Gasparik and Newton (1984). The present data, however, do not confirm the negative slopes of Al-isopleths in the spinel lherzolite field suggested by Dixon and Presnall (1980). The new model has been used to calculate a graphical two-pyroxene thermobarometer applicable to natural two-pyroxene assemblages closely approaching in composition the CMAS system.

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  1. Department of the Geophysical Sciences, University of Chicago, 60637, Chicago, Illinois, USA

    Tibor Gasparik

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Gasparik, T. Two-pyroxene thermobarometry with new experimental data in the system CaO-MgO-Al2O3-SiO2 . Contr. Mineral. and Petrol. 87, 87–97 (1984). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00371405

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