Petrology, Mineralogy and Geochemistry of the Emeishan Continental Flood Basalts, SW China: Evidence for Activity of Mantle Plumes

Abstract Electronic microprobe analyses for olivine, clinopyroxene and Cr‐spinel in picrites, which we have discovered recently in the Emeishan continental flood basalt province (ECFBP), show that the olivine is rich in Mg, and that Cr‐spinel is rich in Cr. Based on the olivine‐melt equilibrium, the primary parental melt compositions are calculated. The high‐Mg olivine‐hosted picrite can be regarded as parental melt. Thus, the melting temperature and pressure are estimated: T=1600°C and P=4.5 GPa. It suggests that the picrites are connected with the activity of mantle plumes. Their major element composition is comparable to many other CFBs by their high Fe₈, (CaO/Al₂O₃)₈ and low Na₈, indicating a high pressure. All rocks display a similar chondrite‐normalized REE patterns, i.e., enrichment of LREE, relative depletion of HFSE and absence of negative Nb and Ta but depletion in P and K. Some incompatible element ratios, such as La/Ta, La/ Sm, (La/Nb)_pM, (Th/Ta)_pM, are in a limited range, show that they were derived from the mantle plume, and there was no or little crustal contamination during magma ascent en route to the surface. They were generated by 7% partial melting of garnet peridotite. The axis of the plume might be located beneath Lijiang Town, Yunnan province.