Journal
EARTH AND PLANETARY SCIENCE LETTERS
Volume 460, Issue -, Pages 50-59Publisher
ELSEVIER
DOI: 10.1016/j.epsl.2016.11.055
Keywords
buoyancy; capillary processes; percolation theory; submarine volcanism; X-ray microtomography
Categories
Funding
- US National Science Foundation [EAR 1447559]
- Directorate For Geosciences [1447559] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
- Division Of Earth Sciences [1447559] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
- Division Of Ocean Sciences
- Directorate For Geosciences [1357443] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
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Pumice can float on water for months to years - long enough for pumice to travel across oceans and facilitate the spread of species. Long-lived pumice floatation is unexpected, however, because pumice pores are highly connected and water wets volcanic glass. As a result, observations of long floating times have not been reconciled with predictions of rapid sinking. We propose a mechanism to resolve this paradox - the trapping of gas bubbles by water within the pumice. Gas trapping refers to the isolation of gas by water within pore throats such that the gas becomes disconnected from the atmosphere and unable to escape. We use X-ray microtomography to image partially saturated pumice and demonstrate that non-condensable gas trapping occurs in both ambient temperature and hot (500 degrees C) pumice. Furthermore, we show that the size distribution of trapped gas clusters matches predictions of percolation theory. Finally, we propose that diffusion of trapped gas determines pumice floatation time. Experimental measurements of pumice floatation support a diffusion control on pumice buoyancy and we find that floatation time tau scales as tau proportional to L-2/D theta(2) where L is the characteristic length of pumice, D is the gas-water diffusion coefficient, and 0 is pumice water saturation. A mechanistic understanding of pumice floatation is a step towards understanding how pumice is partitioned into floating and sinking components and provides an estimate for the lifetime of pumice rafts in the ocean. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
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