Petrology of the Apollo 12 Pigeonite Basalt Suite

摘要

A comparative petrologic study of the Apollo 12 pigeonite basalt suite has been undertaken to answer the following questions: (1) What are the textural and petrologic variations within the pigeonite suite. (2) Are these variations consistent with the hypothesis that the pigeonite basalts are related by crystal fractionation to the olivine basalts. Texturally, the pigeonite basalts range from porphyritic samples with a very fine-grained variolitic groundmass to coarse-grained microgabbro samples with ophitic to graphic textures. The abundances of olivine and Cr-spinel continuously decrease with increasing grain size, whereas the abundances of plagioclase and ilmenite steadily increase. Petrologically, increasing grain size is accompanied by increased Ca in plagioclase, increased Fe in pyroxene, olivine, and spinel, and less Al, Ti, and Cr in pyroxene. All of these changes, including the differences in bulk chemistry can be explained by near-surface fractionation of olivine, pigeonite, and Cr-spinel with the compositions of the observed phenocryst phases. (ERA citation 04:047571)