WEBVTT 00:00:11.020 --> 00:00:16.899 Lost in the fog of a cosmic storm Floating on 00:00:16.899 --> 00:00:21.140 whimsical wavelengths is the norm Dancing through 00:00:21.140 --> 00:00:28.050 the stars, chasing spectrums of light Waves that 00:00:28.050 --> 00:00:58.869 are just out of sight For me, as a volcanologist, 00:00:59.009 --> 00:01:01.429 it has to be because of the two active volcanoes, 00:01:01.850 --> 00:01:05.090 Kilauea and Mauna Loa, that are accessible through 00:01:05.090 --> 00:01:08.629 the national park. For me, that's enough right 00:01:08.629 --> 00:01:13.569 there. But it also has mind -blowing microclimates, 00:01:13.590 --> 00:01:16.670 different ecological zones with different species. 00:01:17.590 --> 00:01:22.109 The island laid back culture, too. It's also 00:01:22.109 --> 00:01:23.810 on the front line of what happens when a new 00:01:23.810 --> 00:01:26.409 species is introduced into systems they didn't 00:01:26.409 --> 00:01:30.920 evolve with. Some areas, you might need to sleep 00:01:30.920 --> 00:01:32.840 with earplugs on the Big Island Hawaii because 00:01:32.840 --> 00:01:36.359 of the koki frogs. We're back, audio -wise anyway, 00:01:36.500 --> 00:01:38.760 to visit Kilauea Volcano due to a recent paper 00:01:38.760 --> 00:01:41.060 published that I became aware of on LinkedIn. 00:01:41.799 --> 00:01:45.180 Where to start the intro? Well, Kilauea has been 00:01:45.180 --> 00:01:48.319 in a near -constant state of unrest my entire 00:01:48.319 --> 00:01:51.799 life. It is also one of the best -studied volcanoes 00:01:51.799 --> 00:01:55.209 in the world. It is well monitored from the ground 00:01:55.209 --> 00:01:57.810 through gas geochemistry, seismic stations, permanent 00:01:57.810 --> 00:02:00.430 GPS stations, tilt meters, and a variety of other 00:02:00.430 --> 00:02:03.890 direct measurements. All this is augmented with 00:02:03.890 --> 00:02:06.909 remote sensing data as well from space. It's 00:02:06.909 --> 00:02:10.870 a highly studied place, and there is so much 00:02:10.870 --> 00:02:14.550 we don't know. So a bit of context and details 00:02:14.550 --> 00:02:17.430 to make the conversation with today's guest more 00:02:17.430 --> 00:02:22.080 intelligible. for all the non -volcanically obsessed 00:02:22.080 --> 00:02:25.560 individuals listening. Normally, we volcanologists 00:02:25.560 --> 00:02:28.879 think about eruption dynamics. We think about 00:02:28.879 --> 00:02:31.900 changes near the surface and how it affects other 00:02:31.900 --> 00:02:35.219 magma storage in the system. You can think of 00:02:35.219 --> 00:02:38.080 it in terms of pressure. Erupting one batch of 00:02:38.080 --> 00:02:40.520 magma lowers the pressure, potentially causing 00:02:40.520 --> 00:02:43.819 more material to erupt. You can think of it a 00:02:43.819 --> 00:02:47.419 bit like a cascade of effects. This is a top 00:02:47.419 --> 00:02:50.360 -down view. It makes sense to think of it this 00:02:50.360 --> 00:02:52.719 way for volcanoes with long periods of being 00:02:52.719 --> 00:02:55.680 dormant. It does not mean that mantle dynamics 00:02:55.680 --> 00:02:58.639 don't have any effect. It's just what happens 00:02:58.639 --> 00:03:01.419 there does not directly affect the volcanic behavior 00:03:01.419 --> 00:03:05.340 at the Earth's surface, as far as we can tell, 00:03:05.439 --> 00:03:08.919 at least normally. In my opinion, Kilauea is 00:03:08.919 --> 00:03:12.080 a very special volcano. It is a hotspot volcano 00:03:12.080 --> 00:03:14.900 sitting over what we conceptualize as a mantle 00:03:14.900 --> 00:03:18.840 plume. This is where hot mantle rocks, carrying 00:03:18.840 --> 00:03:22.340 heat slowly rise from near the core of the planet 00:03:22.340 --> 00:03:26.759 towards the lithosphere, the solid part of the 00:03:26.759 --> 00:03:30.000 Earth that we all live on. As that material, 00:03:30.340 --> 00:03:32.719 even though it's solid, it can still flow. As 00:03:32.719 --> 00:03:37.620 it begins to rise, the pressure on it begins 00:03:37.620 --> 00:03:43.490 to drop, which changes its melting point. Once 00:03:43.490 --> 00:03:46.389 that material, which is slowly flowing through 00:03:46.389 --> 00:03:51.050 viscous flow, it's not really a liquid. It's 00:03:51.050 --> 00:03:55.250 just deforming due to stresses. Once it hits 00:03:55.250 --> 00:03:57.669 a threshold, it can melt. It's a combination 00:03:57.669 --> 00:04:01.169 of the heat it's carrying and being brought to 00:04:01.169 --> 00:04:04.629 a level closer to the Earth's surface, which 00:04:04.629 --> 00:04:08.090 reduces pressure. Remember water? It has a different 00:04:08.090 --> 00:04:10.689 boiling point and freezing points, for that matter, 00:04:10.750 --> 00:04:13.330 at different pressures. Like on top of a mountain, 00:04:13.449 --> 00:04:15.629 it boils at a lower temperature than at sea level. 00:04:16.310 --> 00:04:20.990 Magma is no different. Okay, so today's topic 00:04:20.990 --> 00:04:24.310 is Kilauea's magma system, looking at a simplified 00:04:24.310 --> 00:04:28.370 model that shows sometimes its bottoms up. So 00:04:28.370 --> 00:04:30.610 please welcome someone who started in Italy at 00:04:30.610 --> 00:04:33.449 the University of Bologna and is now a PhD candidate 00:04:33.449 --> 00:04:38.350 at Rice University, Gaetano Ferranta. That's 00:04:38.350 --> 00:04:40.870 good, that's good, yes. I got it close enough 00:04:40.870 --> 00:04:45.170 to correct. No, no, no, it's very close. Well, 00:04:45.290 --> 00:04:46.910 thanks for being here. And I guess we always 00:04:46.910 --> 00:04:49.970 kind of start with a little bit about who you 00:04:49.970 --> 00:04:52.550 are as a guest and how you ended up in the science 00:04:52.550 --> 00:04:56.129 field. So how did you end up in STEM as a PhD? 00:04:56.529 --> 00:04:59.389 Was it a childhood dream or was it like something 00:04:59.389 --> 00:05:02.189 that came much later? That's a very good question. 00:05:02.250 --> 00:05:04.370 Well, first of all, Jeff, thanks for having me. 00:05:04.470 --> 00:05:08.009 It is my first podcast, so I'm quite excited 00:05:08.009 --> 00:05:11.009 about this. Well, and to be fair, I jumped at 00:05:11.009 --> 00:05:13.009 the opportunity because your paper came in actually 00:05:13.009 --> 00:05:16.050 in my feed and LinkedIn. Yeah. Me being a volcanologist, 00:05:16.129 --> 00:05:18.310 having worked at Kilauea and Mauna Loa. And I 00:05:18.310 --> 00:05:21.329 was like, this is cool. I want to talk about 00:05:21.329 --> 00:05:24.350 this. And so I reached out to you and here you 00:05:24.350 --> 00:05:27.810 are. So this is awesome. Maybe it's just because 00:05:27.810 --> 00:05:29.910 I wanted to nerd out real hard, but that's part 00:05:29.910 --> 00:05:32.720 of the reason why I have the podcast. But let's 00:05:32.720 --> 00:05:36.680 go back to how you ended up as a PhD first. That's 00:05:36.680 --> 00:05:40.480 a very tough question. I don't think it was a 00:05:40.480 --> 00:05:43.259 childhood dream. I've always been interested 00:05:43.259 --> 00:05:47.259 in science, but I didn't know necessarily what 00:05:47.259 --> 00:05:52.459 to do with my career up until the very end of 00:05:52.459 --> 00:05:58.009 my high school. To be honest, I was really drawn 00:05:58.009 --> 00:06:00.949 into STEM because of earth science, even if I 00:06:00.949 --> 00:06:04.670 took an unusual path because I studied physics 00:06:04.670 --> 00:06:08.569 first for my undergrad. But in reality, I went 00:06:08.569 --> 00:06:12.790 to Bologna because there was a master's program 00:06:12.790 --> 00:06:15.490 there called Physics of the Earth System. So 00:06:15.490 --> 00:06:17.230 that's actually what I was really interested 00:06:17.230 --> 00:06:20.629 in. And I decided to study physics for my undergrad, 00:06:20.709 --> 00:06:22.829 but I already knew at that time that I was going 00:06:22.829 --> 00:06:27.139 to pivot. to the earth signs, let's say. But 00:06:27.139 --> 00:06:30.060 no, not necessarily a childhood dream. One could 00:06:30.060 --> 00:06:33.839 say that probably living near volcanoes my whole 00:06:33.839 --> 00:06:36.879 life has kind of shaped that idea in my subconscious, 00:06:37.199 --> 00:06:39.720 even if I didn't know. But yeah, I discovered 00:06:39.720 --> 00:06:42.980 it quite late. So I guess you just mentioned 00:06:42.980 --> 00:06:45.879 Italy is full of volcanoes. I have yet to be 00:06:45.879 --> 00:06:47.959 there. That is on my bucket list from Etna to 00:06:47.959 --> 00:06:50.660 Stromboli to Vesuvius. There's just so many, 00:06:50.720 --> 00:06:53.360 so many stories, so many dynamic systems. So 00:06:53.360 --> 00:06:55.800 which one did you grow up near or was it just 00:06:55.800 --> 00:06:58.000 more of in the culture of Italy? Because I know 00:06:58.000 --> 00:07:01.779 Italy is not, I mean, yes, Canada and US is way 00:07:01.779 --> 00:07:03.300 bigger than Italy, but it's not like there's 00:07:03.300 --> 00:07:05.620 volcanoes everywhere throughout Italy. And then 00:07:05.620 --> 00:07:09.370 secondly, it's like, why? Why go from there with 00:07:09.370 --> 00:07:12.050 all of these volcanoes steeped in history to 00:07:12.050 --> 00:07:14.110 Kilauea? Like, how did you make that transition 00:07:14.110 --> 00:07:18.290 and jump? Yeah, so I actually did live near a 00:07:18.290 --> 00:07:21.250 volcano because I come from a very small town 00:07:21.250 --> 00:07:24.269 in the south called San Potito San Nitigo, which 00:07:24.269 --> 00:07:28.910 is an hour away from Naples. And so Vesuvius 00:07:28.910 --> 00:07:31.910 was the closest one, but also Campi Flegrei, 00:07:32.009 --> 00:07:36.250 which is probably less towering, but as dangerous, 00:07:36.310 --> 00:07:39.079 if not more. Yeah, scarier. Yeah, much scarier. 00:07:40.079 --> 00:07:44.560 So definitely did live near a volcano. I always 00:07:44.560 --> 00:07:48.500 wanted to study abroad, and I never really had 00:07:48.500 --> 00:07:52.680 the chance to, partly because when I really made 00:07:52.680 --> 00:07:55.319 up my mind and decided I wanted to do that, COVID 00:07:55.319 --> 00:07:59.879 hit, and so I was actually stuck. So I finished 00:07:59.879 --> 00:08:03.779 my master's in Italy, and then I was considering 00:08:03.779 --> 00:08:08.040 doing a PhD in the US. And I started looking 00:08:08.040 --> 00:08:11.879 at different programs and my advisors back then 00:08:11.879 --> 00:08:14.220 helped me a lot. And at some point I stumbled 00:08:14.220 --> 00:08:18.579 into what eventually became my current project. 00:08:18.899 --> 00:08:23.019 And I started learning more about Hawaii. And, 00:08:23.160 --> 00:08:25.480 you know, I had never thought about potentially 00:08:25.480 --> 00:08:29.139 working on Hawaii, let alone going to Hawaii. 00:08:29.279 --> 00:08:33.659 So for me, it was a whole new thing. And I was 00:08:33.659 --> 00:08:37.480 very, very intrigued. And I eventually decided 00:08:37.480 --> 00:08:40.759 to do that. So during my first year, I had the 00:08:40.759 --> 00:08:42.980 chance to go there for the first time. I spent 00:08:42.980 --> 00:08:46.259 a week on the Big Island and then a month in 00:08:46.259 --> 00:08:49.879 Honolulu while my advisor was doing a sabbatical 00:08:49.879 --> 00:08:52.440 there. And it was just a life -changing experience. 00:08:52.720 --> 00:08:56.440 Yeah, for sure. I don't know. I can't sing the 00:08:56.440 --> 00:08:58.480 praises of the Big Island enough. Now, I will 00:08:58.480 --> 00:09:01.200 say the one thing, the only thing, and I do mean 00:09:01.200 --> 00:09:04.629 the only thing that drove me crazy about... mainly 00:09:04.629 --> 00:09:06.610 the big island was how much drinking and driving 00:09:06.610 --> 00:09:09.009 actually occurs because people show up to the 00:09:09.009 --> 00:09:11.169 beach with a case of beer and then they drive 00:09:11.169 --> 00:09:14.950 home that's a good point i actually never thought 00:09:14.950 --> 00:09:17.629 of that but yeah it must be a big problem yeah 00:09:17.629 --> 00:09:19.129 i don't know if it's a big problem it's just 00:09:19.129 --> 00:09:21.429 something i noticed everywhere okay but i mean 00:09:21.429 --> 00:09:24.230 like the laid -back atmosphere the whole different 00:09:24.230 --> 00:09:27.669 micro climbs just the the people generally are 00:09:27.669 --> 00:09:31.340 just so laid back and chill There's some caveats 00:09:31.340 --> 00:09:33.480 to that, of course, but that's caveats to everywhere 00:09:33.480 --> 00:09:35.580 in this planet Earth that you can find special 00:09:35.580 --> 00:09:39.360 people. But let's dig into the paper in Kilauea 00:09:39.360 --> 00:09:41.720 more specifically instead of reminiscing about 00:09:41.720 --> 00:09:44.480 my time on the Big Island, how I miss it. So 00:09:44.480 --> 00:09:48.220 the paper is Bottoms Up, Coupling vs. Decoupling 00:09:48.220 --> 00:09:51.580 Within Kilauea's Magmatic System. Before we get 00:09:51.580 --> 00:09:54.120 into the science science part, perhaps we should 00:09:54.120 --> 00:09:59.019 start with, is Kilauea normal? I think Kilauea 00:09:59.019 --> 00:10:02.200 is quite special. Well, it is for sure special 00:10:02.200 --> 00:10:05.600 to me, but I also mean it from a volcanological 00:10:05.600 --> 00:10:10.539 perspective. In the simplest sense, we have so 00:10:10.539 --> 00:10:13.899 much data from Kilauea, and it's erupting all 00:10:13.899 --> 00:10:17.580 the time, that it's hard not to consider it as 00:10:17.580 --> 00:10:21.909 a special volcano, because it really... improved 00:10:21.909 --> 00:10:24.350 our understanding of volcanoes in general so 00:10:24.350 --> 00:10:27.370 much by just erupting all the time and giving 00:10:27.370 --> 00:10:30.690 us all this data and all these opportunities 00:10:30.690 --> 00:10:33.909 to actually learn more about the dynamics of 00:10:33.909 --> 00:10:37.230 magma supply and volcanic eruptions in general. 00:10:37.409 --> 00:10:40.389 So I think it's very special. There are other 00:10:40.389 --> 00:10:43.889 volcanoes in the world that might be considered 00:10:43.889 --> 00:10:47.049 similar to Kilauea. But we're talking just a 00:10:47.049 --> 00:10:50.230 handful, right? That's true. You can almost count 00:10:50.230 --> 00:10:52.840 on... Not quite, but you could almost count on 00:10:52.840 --> 00:10:55.440 one hand persistently active volcanoes, those 00:10:55.440 --> 00:10:58.960 that erupt all the time. Maybe you need two hands 00:10:58.960 --> 00:11:01.320 for the whole globe, but it's really a small 00:11:01.320 --> 00:11:03.460 handful of volcanoes. It's a small handful, and 00:11:03.460 --> 00:11:05.519 out of all of those, Kilauea is definitely the 00:11:05.519 --> 00:11:08.139 one that's most monitored and most studied. So 00:11:08.139 --> 00:11:11.429 it's definitely a special volcano. Yeah, this 00:11:11.429 --> 00:11:15.450 is more of a comment from me to say, you know, 00:11:15.450 --> 00:11:17.690 you look at media, you look at everywhere, like 00:11:17.690 --> 00:11:20.490 everyone compares whatever they're seeing to 00:11:20.490 --> 00:11:22.970 Kilauea. Like Kilauea is like the stand -in volcano 00:11:22.970 --> 00:11:26.450 that everything's compared to. Yet at the same 00:11:26.450 --> 00:11:30.169 time, you really can't compare Kilauea to anything 00:11:30.169 --> 00:11:33.129 other than the other Hawaiian volcanoes is kind 00:11:33.129 --> 00:11:34.789 of where I'm going because it is so special. 00:11:36.399 --> 00:11:39.460 yeah how much does it erupt like year on year 00:11:39.460 --> 00:11:42.720 on year on after year after year after year is 00:11:42.720 --> 00:11:47.139 just like the from the sea floor to where its 00:11:47.139 --> 00:11:49.700 current summit is like you you can't really compare 00:11:49.700 --> 00:11:51.919 it to anything other than another hawaiian volcano 00:11:51.919 --> 00:11:56.720 yeah that's true yeah i agree But yeah, we learn 00:11:56.720 --> 00:11:59.659 so much from looking at, if we want to get really 00:11:59.659 --> 00:12:01.860 nerdy and talk about geodesy, so the deformation 00:12:01.860 --> 00:12:05.919 and gravitation of the Earth to just the chemical 00:12:05.919 --> 00:12:09.799 products to the gas geochemistry to earthquakes. 00:12:10.340 --> 00:12:14.919 Yeah, it is so wired. Yeah, and even just how 00:12:14.919 --> 00:12:18.740 volcanoes grow. How do they evolve? Yeah. Looking 00:12:18.740 --> 00:12:23.299 back at the Hawaiian archipelago, we can sort 00:12:23.299 --> 00:12:27.659 of look back in time. uh and uh or forward uh 00:12:27.659 --> 00:12:30.240 and see how eventually these volcanoes will uh 00:12:30.240 --> 00:12:34.600 will evolve and uh and look in the future so 00:12:34.600 --> 00:12:37.360 it's uh yeah it's quite special yeah that's it 00:12:37.360 --> 00:12:39.480 listeners there is a lot we don't know about 00:12:39.480 --> 00:12:42.080 the past and how these volcanoes grow mainly 00:12:42.080 --> 00:12:44.840 because they bury everything and so we don't 00:12:44.840 --> 00:12:46.860 get access to the younger versions of themselves 00:12:47.789 --> 00:12:49.690 Okay, but we're going to cover a lot of different 00:12:49.690 --> 00:12:52.190 things about Kilauea and hopefully get into some 00:12:52.190 --> 00:12:54.730 nitty gritty details. And hopefully I remember 00:12:54.730 --> 00:12:58.450 to use words that is not going to confuse everyone 00:12:58.450 --> 00:13:00.350 else because it's two volcanologists here having 00:13:00.350 --> 00:13:03.129 a chat and there's lots of jargon in the way 00:13:03.129 --> 00:13:05.470 here. So we'll do our best. But to understand 00:13:05.470 --> 00:13:08.269 the paper and Kilauea's magmatic system, what 00:13:08.269 --> 00:13:10.090 are the main parts we should really be thinking 00:13:10.090 --> 00:13:14.179 about here? Well, I think the... One very important 00:13:14.179 --> 00:13:17.679 thing to keep in mind while we talk about this 00:13:17.679 --> 00:13:20.639 paper is that one of the reasons why Kilauea 00:13:20.639 --> 00:13:24.799 is special is that it's not only erupting all 00:13:24.799 --> 00:13:29.860 the time, but it's also being supplied by magma 00:13:29.860 --> 00:13:33.799 all the time. So what we think is that magma 00:13:33.799 --> 00:13:37.500 is almost constantly being replenished from depth, 00:13:37.700 --> 00:13:41.740 from almost 100 kilometers depth where magma 00:13:41.740 --> 00:13:45.639 first forms. beneath Hawaii to the shallow magma 00:13:45.639 --> 00:13:48.639 chambers, which are around two kilometers depth. 00:13:48.919 --> 00:13:52.419 So magma is always flowing in this system, and 00:13:52.419 --> 00:13:55.120 this is very important. And as a consequence 00:13:55.120 --> 00:13:58.399 of that, we think that there's some sort of pathway 00:13:58.399 --> 00:14:02.679 that connects the region where magma forms to 00:14:02.679 --> 00:14:06.320 the shallow magma chambers, and that pathway 00:14:06.320 --> 00:14:10.159 can stay open for long, long time scales. to 00:14:10.159 --> 00:14:12.460 allow these magma to flow and to allow the volcano 00:14:12.460 --> 00:14:15.879 to be persistently active. So I think those are 00:14:15.879 --> 00:14:19.960 two very special elements of Kīlauea and two 00:14:19.960 --> 00:14:22.679 very important things to remember in order to 00:14:22.679 --> 00:14:25.679 understand this paper and the questions that 00:14:25.679 --> 00:14:29.419 this paper tried to answer. Yeah, I guess this 00:14:29.419 --> 00:14:32.700 is kind of a little bit of inside baseball because 00:14:32.700 --> 00:14:36.299 we understand this pretty well that magma cools. 00:14:36.860 --> 00:14:40.320 and so to be able to consistently be able to 00:14:40.320 --> 00:14:42.980 erupt means like over decades and decades and 00:14:42.980 --> 00:14:44.779 decades and decades means you have to have some 00:14:44.779 --> 00:14:47.100 way of getting material in somewhat of a constant 00:14:47.100 --> 00:14:49.639 way to the earth's surface and there's not many 00:14:49.639 --> 00:14:52.259 volcanoes out there that can do this and so being 00:14:52.259 --> 00:14:55.639 able to keep things open is very very difficult 00:14:55.639 --> 00:14:59.279 when everything wants to cool you get viscosity 00:14:59.279 --> 00:15:02.019 so viscosity increases as it cools it doesn't 00:15:02.019 --> 00:15:03.879 want to flow and then it clogs up the pipes and 00:15:05.259 --> 00:15:08.759 That's how most volcanoes work, but Kilauea is 00:15:08.759 --> 00:15:11.080 a little different. One of the things I wanted 00:15:11.080 --> 00:15:14.779 to really drill into is the shallow magmatic 00:15:14.779 --> 00:15:17.440 system a little bit before we go deep. Looking 00:15:17.440 --> 00:15:21.360 a bit from the top, so you said there's... Now, 00:15:21.559 --> 00:15:25.940 I'm not... meaning to contradict anything you 00:15:25.940 --> 00:15:27.980 say. It's just I think we want to get a little 00:15:27.980 --> 00:15:30.200 bit deeper. So the way I understand it, which 00:15:30.200 --> 00:15:33.360 can also change, like from the last time I was 00:15:33.360 --> 00:15:36.440 at HBO, things can also change in the mindset 00:15:36.440 --> 00:15:39.200 of those that are studying it. So feel free to 00:15:39.200 --> 00:15:41.720 correct me. Absolutely. But you can think of 00:15:41.720 --> 00:15:44.980 the shallow system as the pipe in from the base. 00:15:45.059 --> 00:15:47.519 So that's from the deep mental source. And then 00:15:47.519 --> 00:15:52.120 you have a larger summit magma chamber. in the 00:15:52.120 --> 00:15:54.500 southern part of the caldera and it tends to 00:15:54.500 --> 00:15:57.139 be the larger one you have a shallower one underneath 00:15:57.139 --> 00:16:00.000 uh which is a pit crater in the summit which 00:16:00.000 --> 00:16:02.940 i don't know if that's still legit anymore because 00:16:02.940 --> 00:16:06.799 now it's erupting and yeah it's changed it's 00:16:06.799 --> 00:16:09.000 changed shape it's also collapsed in that amount 00:16:09.000 --> 00:16:12.700 of time and then you have the rift zones and 00:16:12.700 --> 00:16:15.460 at least at one time because you could track 00:16:15.460 --> 00:16:20.399 the deformation down the rift zone towards where 00:16:20.399 --> 00:16:24.059 Pu 'u 'o 'o was erupting. So the shallow magmatic 00:16:24.059 --> 00:16:27.240 system is, I guess, bifurcated in some respects, 00:16:27.320 --> 00:16:29.179 that you have some kind of connection to the 00:16:29.179 --> 00:16:32.700 individual rift zones, which the east rift zone 00:16:32.700 --> 00:16:35.120 and the southwest rift zone, and as well as, 00:16:35.159 --> 00:16:38.120 at least there used to be, two summit magma chambers. 00:16:38.740 --> 00:16:42.139 Does that kind of still sum up what we think? 00:16:42.879 --> 00:16:46.179 Yeah, that's correct. And they're super dynamic. 00:16:46.889 --> 00:16:48.950 they're super dynamic there might be even more 00:16:48.950 --> 00:16:51.669 and there are definitely more areas of magma 00:16:51.669 --> 00:16:54.309 accumulation even in the summit itself the two 00:16:54.309 --> 00:16:56.610 ones like you like you said that are usually 00:16:56.610 --> 00:16:59.190 most active are the Halema 'uma 'u reservoir 00:16:59.190 --> 00:17:03.610 in the south caldera and we still don't fully 00:17:03.610 --> 00:17:07.210 understand the connection between all these magma 00:17:07.210 --> 00:17:11.150 chambers and to the rift zone also i think because 00:17:11.150 --> 00:17:14.680 the connection is not static connection changes 00:17:14.680 --> 00:17:17.339 with time. So maybe during an eruption, the connection 00:17:17.339 --> 00:17:20.799 will be different than during another eruption. 00:17:21.039 --> 00:17:25.039 And maybe you can reach pressure threshold where 00:17:25.039 --> 00:17:28.180 new connections can open up. So yeah, it's all 00:17:28.180 --> 00:17:33.720 correct. Yeah. But as far as this particular 00:17:33.720 --> 00:17:36.279 paper goes, yes, the two main reservoirs that 00:17:36.279 --> 00:17:39.319 we need are the Halema 'uma 'u Reservoir and 00:17:39.319 --> 00:17:42.880 the South Caldera Reservoir. Right. So one is 00:17:43.309 --> 00:17:47.049 The Halema 'uma 'u one is shallower. But I wanted 00:17:47.049 --> 00:17:49.349 to get, before we look at the bottom processes, 00:17:49.470 --> 00:17:51.250 I kind of wanted to look at the top -down processes, 00:17:51.309 --> 00:17:55.130 because these are the ones that if you are sitting 00:17:55.130 --> 00:17:57.690 there by the computer watching the data coming 00:17:57.690 --> 00:18:00.569 in from the USGS, looking for your chance to 00:18:00.569 --> 00:18:03.829 rush out for the next episodic fountaining eruption, 00:18:04.029 --> 00:18:05.789 you're going to be paying attention to those 00:18:05.789 --> 00:18:09.980 shallow subsurface... activities and stuff like 00:18:09.980 --> 00:18:12.299 that. So what are some of the examples that you 00:18:12.299 --> 00:18:15.980 might see in the data? Yeah, I mean, shallow 00:18:15.980 --> 00:18:19.519 processes are what we are naturally driven to 00:18:19.519 --> 00:18:22.440 look at. For example, in the current eruption, 00:18:22.779 --> 00:18:26.740 during an eruption itself, magma empties out 00:18:26.740 --> 00:18:29.559 while erupting at the surface, and then at some 00:18:29.559 --> 00:18:33.849 point it empties out the reservoir so much. that 00:18:33.849 --> 00:18:37.170 it just cannot erupt anymore and so now the eruption 00:18:37.170 --> 00:18:40.009 stops and the magma chambers need to replenish 00:18:40.009 --> 00:18:44.230 until they can erupt again or in 2018 so much 00:18:44.230 --> 00:18:47.710 magma was emptied from the magma chamber that 00:18:47.710 --> 00:18:51.829 the caldera collapsed and the caldera collapse 00:18:51.829 --> 00:18:54.930 actually drove the whole eruption which otherwise 00:18:54.930 --> 00:18:57.799 would have stopped much earlier if that didn't 00:18:57.799 --> 00:19:01.380 happen so there are a lot of processes shallow 00:19:01.380 --> 00:19:05.680 processes that can actually drive eruptions and 00:19:05.680 --> 00:19:10.049 so not everything is driven from the bottom But 00:19:10.049 --> 00:19:12.329 what I wanted to convey through this paper is 00:19:12.329 --> 00:19:15.130 that sometimes not everything is driven by the 00:19:15.130 --> 00:19:18.890 top either. Exactly. Now, I'm going to maybe 00:19:18.890 --> 00:19:21.309 diverge a little bit here, but it's interesting. 00:19:21.410 --> 00:19:24.849 I came to this topic from a very different perspective 00:19:24.849 --> 00:19:28.349 because in my master's, I worked on top -down 00:19:28.349 --> 00:19:32.490 processes. I think in my master's paper, there's 00:19:32.490 --> 00:19:36.750 top -down in the title. So there's a back story 00:19:36.750 --> 00:19:40.230 of the title. Yeah. it's a very different process 00:19:40.230 --> 00:19:42.750 though um so in my masters i was very interested 00:19:42.750 --> 00:19:46.910 in understanding why uh volcanoes in in continental 00:19:46.910 --> 00:19:50.329 rifts change their locations over time and so 00:19:50.329 --> 00:19:53.150 eventually what we discovered is that the stress 00:19:53.150 --> 00:19:57.089 field generated by the deepening of the continental 00:19:57.089 --> 00:20:00.309 rift basin over time as it becomes deeper and 00:20:00.309 --> 00:20:03.289 deeper changes the stress field in the crust 00:20:03.289 --> 00:20:08.509 and when magma ascends to the surface in the 00:20:08.509 --> 00:20:12.630 form of dikes, of hydraulic fractures, the trajectory 00:20:12.630 --> 00:20:15.750 that these dikes follow are very sensitive to 00:20:15.750 --> 00:20:18.630 the stress field. And so their location changes 00:20:18.630 --> 00:20:21.150 over time according to the stress field generated 00:20:21.150 --> 00:20:24.690 by these very shallow processes. So this is sort 00:20:24.690 --> 00:20:26.930 of like the definition of a top -down process. 00:20:28.069 --> 00:20:30.710 But this is, again, a very different process. 00:20:30.950 --> 00:20:34.720 And it sort of answers your question of why Kilauea 00:20:34.720 --> 00:20:36.920 is so special, right? Kilauea is erupting all 00:20:36.920 --> 00:20:39.480 the time. We're not creating, sometimes we are 00:20:39.480 --> 00:20:42.380 creating new fractures, but these deep pathways 00:20:42.380 --> 00:20:45.160 thought to be a very well -established pathway 00:20:45.160 --> 00:20:49.619 that just feeds magma from tens of kilometers 00:20:49.619 --> 00:20:52.839 of depth to the surface, and it's very stable. 00:20:53.589 --> 00:20:56.750 Okay, so I want to take one short deviation only 00:20:56.750 --> 00:20:59.670 because I have some background knowledge because 00:20:59.670 --> 00:21:01.809 otherwise I would have no idea this exists. And 00:21:01.809 --> 00:21:03.650 then we'll get to those deep ones, those much 00:21:03.650 --> 00:21:06.069 more stable, and we'll explore that a little 00:21:06.069 --> 00:21:08.349 bit. But when we think about the shallow stuff, 00:21:08.470 --> 00:21:10.410 we're usually thinking about differences in pressure. 00:21:10.650 --> 00:21:13.529 So usually to do with the volatile. So any longtime 00:21:13.529 --> 00:21:16.210 listener should know that volcanoes erupt. Yes, 00:21:16.289 --> 00:21:17.990 you need a certain amount of heat. Yes, you need 00:21:17.990 --> 00:21:19.470 this, you need that. But fundamentally without... 00:21:19.759 --> 00:21:21.559 volatiles it'll never erupt you'll never get 00:21:21.559 --> 00:21:23.420 a density lower than the rocks it's pushing up 00:21:23.420 --> 00:21:25.640 through so when we're starting to look at a lot 00:21:25.640 --> 00:21:28.400 of these shallow processes our understanding 00:21:28.400 --> 00:21:31.960 is that a lot of it's to do with pressure with 00:21:31.960 --> 00:21:36.779 the volatiles and the rocks or the chamber itself 00:21:36.779 --> 00:21:40.259 how much can that chamber hold before having 00:21:40.259 --> 00:21:43.480 that either fail or push the magma into another 00:21:43.480 --> 00:21:47.309 location And so in Kilauea, we see a lot of these 00:21:47.309 --> 00:21:50.890 things and they use terminology like DI or ID 00:21:50.890 --> 00:21:53.970 or DID events. And that stands for deflation 00:21:53.970 --> 00:21:56.809 and inflation, the D and the I. So the idea is 00:21:56.809 --> 00:21:59.130 just before a large eruption at the summit where 00:21:59.130 --> 00:22:00.950 they have the fountaining, you'll get a quick 00:22:00.950 --> 00:22:03.130 deflation where the whole ground is actually 00:22:03.130 --> 00:22:05.829 deforming kind of downwards. It's deflating as 00:22:05.829 --> 00:22:07.950 the pressure is rising to the Earth's surface 00:22:07.950 --> 00:22:16.009 to cause that eruption. you empty the magma chamber 00:22:16.009 --> 00:22:17.890 and that's what that deflation is that magma 00:22:17.890 --> 00:22:20.250 chamber emptying and then once it's empty and 00:22:20.250 --> 00:22:22.029 the eruption has stopped it starts to refill 00:22:22.029 --> 00:22:24.710 again which then inflates and so you can actually 00:22:24.710 --> 00:22:27.549 get these over the course of 24 hours even without 00:22:27.549 --> 00:22:31.170 an eruption especially during the puo times and 00:22:31.170 --> 00:22:33.549 there's just so many different shallow processes 00:22:33.549 --> 00:22:36.970 that happen as these pressure pulses that have 00:22:36.970 --> 00:22:40.900 been created by the gas or the volatiles instead 00:22:40.900 --> 00:22:43.980 of what's down at depth because what we down 00:22:43.980 --> 00:22:46.799 at depth in general we don't get to directly 00:22:46.799 --> 00:22:50.759 see and so that's where this story really turns 00:22:50.759 --> 00:22:52.700 because now we're going to talk about the deep 00:22:52.700 --> 00:22:56.839 section so what about the deep part more generally 00:22:56.839 --> 00:22:59.200 besides it's stable like how do we even know 00:22:59.200 --> 00:23:01.119 that something changes down there it's so far 00:23:01.119 --> 00:23:04.680 away that it's not like our tilt meters or gps's 00:23:04.680 --> 00:23:08.420 it's we can't see it directly can we That's true. 00:23:08.519 --> 00:23:11.200 No, we cannot see it directly. We can use some 00:23:11.200 --> 00:23:16.000 proxies. One very useful data sets that volcanologists 00:23:16.000 --> 00:23:20.059 in Hawaii use to track changes and what happens 00:23:20.059 --> 00:23:24.779 at depth is CO2 emission rates. So magmas, when 00:23:24.779 --> 00:23:28.019 they form at depth, they contain dissolved CO2 00:23:28.019 --> 00:23:32.220 and other volatiles. But CO2 is interesting because 00:23:32.220 --> 00:23:36.339 it has a very low solubility. meaning that it 00:23:36.339 --> 00:23:39.160 wants to come out of the solution, it wants to 00:23:39.160 --> 00:23:41.759 come out of the magma and form bubbles at very 00:23:41.759 --> 00:23:44.579 large depths. So for Kilauea, for the composition 00:23:44.579 --> 00:23:47.480 of the magma that is erupted at Kilauea, we think 00:23:47.480 --> 00:23:52.059 that at depths of about 35 kilometers, CO2 starts 00:23:52.059 --> 00:23:54.619 to come out of the magma and form bubbles. Wow, 00:23:54.619 --> 00:23:58.400 35 kilometers? That's extremely deep. Oh my goodness. 00:23:58.579 --> 00:24:01.599 Not all of the CO2 will come out there, but it 00:24:01.599 --> 00:24:04.589 will start coming out. yeah as the solubility 00:24:04.589 --> 00:24:07.509 decreases as it gets to lower pressures but 35 00:24:07.509 --> 00:24:11.130 kilometers damn yeah just for context i think 00:24:11.130 --> 00:24:14.890 the magma forms around 65 kilometers depth if 00:24:14.890 --> 00:24:17.690 i remember correctly for hawaii so you're you're 00:24:17.690 --> 00:24:19.970 you're not even halfway there and you're starting 00:24:19.970 --> 00:24:24.309 to lose volatiles i guess that's also yeah that 00:24:24.309 --> 00:24:27.690 must come into the whole processes of deep right 00:24:27.690 --> 00:24:32.539 like The whole rise rates, do they pick up after 00:24:32.539 --> 00:24:35.519 about 35 kilometers? Does the magma start to 00:24:35.519 --> 00:24:38.000 accelerate because the density is starting to 00:24:38.000 --> 00:24:42.960 drop? Well, not necessarily. That's a very good 00:24:42.960 --> 00:24:45.779 question. It kind of gets in the details of how 00:24:45.779 --> 00:24:51.700 we perceive magma flow. But at those, the speeds 00:24:51.700 --> 00:24:55.420 at which magma ascends, given our estimates of 00:24:55.420 --> 00:24:58.309 supply rate, are actually quite high. And so 00:24:58.309 --> 00:25:02.369 the difference in velocity between the gas and 00:25:02.369 --> 00:25:07.329 the melt is actually not that great. So the magma 00:25:07.329 --> 00:25:10.730 is already quite fast. Why would it be quite 00:25:10.730 --> 00:25:15.029 fast at that? Is it density driven? Heat driven? 00:25:15.630 --> 00:25:19.069 It's mostly pressure driven. Okay. So we can 00:25:19.069 --> 00:25:22.589 get into detail. Of course. Talk nerdy to us. 00:25:24.700 --> 00:25:31.599 Well, let me finish about CO2 first. So if CO2 00:25:31.599 --> 00:25:34.200 tracks the amount of magma that's coming out 00:25:34.200 --> 00:25:37.920 from depth, then changes in CO2 at the surface 00:25:37.920 --> 00:25:41.380 are usually interpreted as changes in the rate 00:25:41.380 --> 00:25:44.440 at which magma is supplied to the shallow plumbing 00:25:44.440 --> 00:25:47.079 system. And that's essentially what happened 00:25:47.079 --> 00:25:50.759 in the early 2000s. Measurements of CO2 prior 00:25:50.759 --> 00:25:54.609 to that were actually very rare. also because 00:25:54.609 --> 00:25:58.710 it was not changing a lot. And if you plot CO2 00:25:58.710 --> 00:26:00.789 emission rates as a function of time, it's almost 00:26:00.789 --> 00:26:04.089 a flat line because the magma supply rate was 00:26:04.089 --> 00:26:06.230 thought to be almost constant. But at some point, 00:26:06.289 --> 00:26:10.589 there was a big bump in 2003 that lasted up until 00:26:10.589 --> 00:26:14.569 2007. And so that was interpreted as a change 00:26:14.569 --> 00:26:17.130 from depth, as a change in the rate at which 00:26:17.130 --> 00:26:20.430 magma was supplied from depth. So like you mentioned, 00:26:20.529 --> 00:26:22.670 we cannot directly see what's happening there, 00:26:22.769 --> 00:26:25.630 but we can use proxies to understand if something 00:26:25.630 --> 00:26:28.069 is changing. Now I've forgotten what the other 00:26:28.069 --> 00:26:30.490 part of the whole thing I was getting. Oh, speed. 00:26:30.690 --> 00:26:34.230 That's what I was going to. Yes. Yeah. You were 00:26:34.230 --> 00:26:38.049 going to go into the details. Yeah. So as I said, 00:26:38.049 --> 00:26:41.450 one main thing to understand the paper is the 00:26:41.450 --> 00:26:44.329 fact that magma is constantly flowing. Another 00:26:44.329 --> 00:26:49.730 thing is to think about is pressure. If there 00:26:49.730 --> 00:26:54.549 is a big, well -developed conduit that's feeding 00:26:54.549 --> 00:26:58.349 magma to the volcano up to tens of kilometers 00:26:58.349 --> 00:27:04.049 of depth to the surface, which is implied by 00:27:04.049 --> 00:27:07.430 the fact that melt is always being produced and 00:27:07.430 --> 00:27:10.609 it's always being transported, then what is the 00:27:10.609 --> 00:27:14.230 pressure in that conduit? So as far as I see 00:27:14.230 --> 00:27:17.369 it, there's two really main end members. One 00:27:17.369 --> 00:27:20.470 is that the pressure follows the weight of the 00:27:20.470 --> 00:27:23.750 magma itself. So it's a magma static pressure 00:27:23.750 --> 00:27:28.450 profile. That's a mouthful. Yeah, it is, it is. 00:27:28.569 --> 00:27:32.210 A magma static pressure profile. That's true, 00:27:32.349 --> 00:27:36.259 yeah. So for someone who... If you can think 00:27:36.259 --> 00:27:38.920 of, I guess we're going to go back to hydrostatic 00:27:38.920 --> 00:27:40.859 just because that's something everyone who's 00:27:40.859 --> 00:27:42.839 listening probably understood. You go deeper 00:27:42.839 --> 00:27:44.960 into the pool, you have more pressure on your 00:27:44.960 --> 00:27:48.680 ears. Exactly. In this case, we're just saying 00:27:48.680 --> 00:27:53.740 the deeper down the tube or system, you have 00:27:53.740 --> 00:27:56.460 more magma above you creating that pressure, 00:27:56.599 --> 00:27:58.400 magma static pressure. Is that what you're saying? 00:27:58.440 --> 00:28:00.880 Exactly. That's true. Yeah. So the pool is made 00:28:00.880 --> 00:28:07.210 of magma. as as magma actually flows upwards 00:28:07.210 --> 00:28:11.130 the pressure decreases decreases because mostly 00:28:11.130 --> 00:28:15.089 of two reasons one is that you're reducing the 00:28:15.089 --> 00:28:17.269 weight of the magma column because you're now 00:28:17.269 --> 00:28:20.970 up higher the second one is because you're using 00:28:20.970 --> 00:28:23.470 some of the pressure that you had to overcome 00:28:23.470 --> 00:28:30.210 friction this goes drag so if the pressure inside 00:28:30.210 --> 00:28:33.890 the magma was only due to the weight of the magma 00:28:33.890 --> 00:28:37.490 itself, then it means that the pressure that 00:28:37.490 --> 00:28:40.849 you lose because of viscosity needs to be negligible. 00:28:41.009 --> 00:28:43.210 And that will happen, for example, if you have 00:28:43.210 --> 00:28:47.009 a big pipe. The viscous pressure loss, this is 00:28:47.009 --> 00:28:50.170 how it's usually called, becomes smaller and 00:28:50.170 --> 00:28:55.349 smaller as the conduit that your fluid is flowing 00:28:55.349 --> 00:28:57.930 through becomes larger. So if you had a big pipe, 00:28:58.089 --> 00:29:01.490 then you can actually sustain a magma static 00:29:01.490 --> 00:29:04.700 pressure. uh with depth the problem with that 00:29:04.700 --> 00:29:10.359 is that the density of the magma is lower than 00:29:10.359 --> 00:29:12.779 the density of the rocks especially if you go 00:29:12.779 --> 00:29:15.160 to the mantle where rocks become very very dense 00:29:15.160 --> 00:29:21.240 and so at depths of about 40 kilometers let's 00:29:21.240 --> 00:29:25.220 say which for kilauea is when we think that magma 00:29:25.220 --> 00:29:28.660 becomes channelized into one individual pathway 00:29:29.470 --> 00:29:32.710 we would expect very, very high pressure differences 00:29:32.710 --> 00:29:39.170 between the magma and the rocks. So it's hard 00:29:39.170 --> 00:29:42.809 to think of how this can be possible. Well, one 00:29:42.809 --> 00:29:46.089 option is that it is actually not possible and 00:29:46.089 --> 00:29:48.269 this pathway will close up. The pressure will 00:29:48.269 --> 00:29:52.849 eventually close the pipe up or close it up to 00:29:52.849 --> 00:29:55.309 a point where the pressure balances the pressure 00:29:55.309 --> 00:29:58.920 outside. Another possibility is that actually 00:29:58.920 --> 00:30:02.180 the flow of magma, since the magma is hot, will 00:30:02.180 --> 00:30:05.440 keep melting the surrounding rocks and the rocks 00:30:05.440 --> 00:30:09.000 will push inward and so you reach a balance between 00:30:09.000 --> 00:30:13.559 the melting of the walls and the closure of the 00:30:13.559 --> 00:30:16.119 pipe to where the pathway can stay open even 00:30:16.119 --> 00:30:20.079 if the pressure is very low. But I think there's 00:30:20.079 --> 00:30:22.799 another problem with that because at Kīlauea 00:30:22.799 --> 00:30:26.289 we have a lot of deep earthquakes. And a lot 00:30:26.289 --> 00:30:28.970 of these deep earthquakes are thought to be due 00:30:28.970 --> 00:30:33.049 to magmatic intrusions. They're not thought to 00:30:33.049 --> 00:30:37.349 be of tectonic origin. So we think that magma 00:30:37.349 --> 00:30:40.289 is maybe opening up new pathways or moving up 00:30:40.289 --> 00:30:43.069 through new pathways and breaking rock. And the 00:30:43.069 --> 00:30:45.869 breaking of those rocks creates new earthquakes. 00:30:46.549 --> 00:30:50.329 But in order for the magma to break rock, the 00:30:50.329 --> 00:30:53.190 pressure in the magma needs to be at least the 00:30:53.190 --> 00:30:56.369 same. as in the surrounding rocks, if not higher. 00:30:56.809 --> 00:30:59.809 And so even if we can keep a pathway open with 00:30:59.809 --> 00:31:02.190 a lower pressure than the surrounding rocks, 00:31:02.430 --> 00:31:04.849 I think it's much more reasonable to think that 00:31:04.849 --> 00:31:09.670 the pressure inside the pathway is at least the 00:31:09.670 --> 00:31:12.690 same as in the surrounding rock. And so I will 00:31:12.690 --> 00:31:15.410 introduce a new term and call this lithostatic. 00:31:16.130 --> 00:31:19.150 So it's the same as before. We're in a pool, 00:31:19.329 --> 00:31:21.990 but instead of a pool of water or of magma, it's 00:31:21.990 --> 00:31:24.599 a pool of rocks. And the pressure will be high. 00:31:25.059 --> 00:31:28.660 Right. Let's just, I just want to, I understand 00:31:28.660 --> 00:31:31.140 everything. I just want to make sure that listeners 00:31:31.140 --> 00:31:33.059 are following along. You're using the word pressure, 00:31:33.180 --> 00:31:36.579 but you could term it differently and use force 00:31:36.579 --> 00:31:39.759 and due to things like buoyancy, right? That's 00:31:39.759 --> 00:31:42.079 true. Yeah. Okay. Just to make sure that those 00:31:42.079 --> 00:31:43.839 are following along, we could be talking about 00:31:43.839 --> 00:31:46.960 a buoyancy force instead of a pressure, but we 00:31:46.960 --> 00:31:51.230 obviously... In this sphere of research, we use 00:31:51.230 --> 00:31:53.630 pressure because it's much easier to deal with 00:31:53.630 --> 00:31:58.670 than 10 to the 16 or 10 to the 32 newtons of 00:31:58.670 --> 00:32:00.809 force or whatever the heck it would be. Pressure 00:32:00.809 --> 00:32:02.690 is just a little easier to deal with. That's 00:32:02.690 --> 00:32:04.890 true. That's true. And so to connect it with 00:32:04.890 --> 00:32:08.250 the velocity, the reason why I went through this 00:32:08.250 --> 00:32:10.490 tangent, which is actually not a tangent. It's 00:32:10.490 --> 00:32:13.150 not a tangent at all. It's really the heart of 00:32:13.150 --> 00:32:18.220 the conceptual model of this paper. if you have 00:32:18.220 --> 00:32:22.700 a such a high pressure gradient because now we're 00:32:22.700 --> 00:32:24.880 assuming that the pressure inside the magma is 00:32:24.880 --> 00:32:28.299 the same as the surrounding rocks then you have 00:32:28.299 --> 00:32:34.019 a high driving pressure and your flow rate through 00:32:34.019 --> 00:32:36.599 this conduit will be high and so the velocity 00:32:36.599 --> 00:32:40.460 can be very high and this makes sense because 00:32:40.460 --> 00:32:43.460 first of all we can now maintain an open pathway 00:32:43.460 --> 00:32:47.170 by simply matching the pressure or the force 00:32:47.170 --> 00:32:50.009 that the surrounding rocks are exerting on the 00:32:50.009 --> 00:32:53.150 conduit with the pressure that the magma is exerting 00:32:53.150 --> 00:32:55.930 on the conduit walls, but in the opposite direction. 00:32:56.329 --> 00:32:59.569 But then we can also maintain flow. We can keep 00:32:59.569 --> 00:33:03.210 this flow going, which is what we need at Kilauea 00:33:03.210 --> 00:33:05.390 because we know that magma is being constantly 00:33:05.390 --> 00:33:08.569 replenished. Yeah, it also makes a lot more conceptual 00:33:08.569 --> 00:33:11.849 sense than trying to melt the wall rocks because 00:33:11.849 --> 00:33:15.900 you... need to have something that is steady 00:33:15.900 --> 00:33:21.099 state exactly and melting is not something you 00:33:21.099 --> 00:33:24.259 do particularly quickly and so how can you keep 00:33:24.259 --> 00:33:27.500 that as a steady state but this isn't always 00:33:27.500 --> 00:33:30.039 steady state and that's where this whole paper 00:33:30.039 --> 00:33:33.240 got born from was the change to that steady state 00:33:33.240 --> 00:33:38.500 in 2003 so how would that if you all of a sudden 00:33:38.500 --> 00:33:41.279 had some more material coming up through that 00:33:41.279 --> 00:33:45.569 narrow Because it is a narrow pipe, right? That's 00:33:45.569 --> 00:33:49.150 true. So what changes do you expect? Can you 00:33:49.150 --> 00:33:52.170 have the pipe collapse due to the increase or 00:33:52.170 --> 00:33:55.309 decrease in pressure? What kind of things should 00:33:55.309 --> 00:33:57.609 we be looking for for changes in the volcanic 00:33:57.609 --> 00:34:00.509 activity at the Earth's surface? Well, this is 00:34:00.509 --> 00:34:05.789 a very good question. So our idea for that is 00:34:05.789 --> 00:34:08.349 that if you have more material coming through, 00:34:08.449 --> 00:34:12.139 then the pressure... inside the pipe needs to 00:34:12.139 --> 00:34:15.960 increase. But if this pipe is very narrow, then 00:34:15.960 --> 00:34:18.619 if the pressure increases, then the dimensions 00:34:18.619 --> 00:34:22.500 of the pipe will increase as well. And if these 00:34:22.500 --> 00:34:25.599 changes are not too big, we can assume that to 00:34:25.599 --> 00:34:31.059 first order the response of this pipe is elastic. 00:34:32.579 --> 00:34:37.039 And this is an important part of the model because 00:34:38.250 --> 00:34:42.369 that's what eventually will lead to our our final 00:34:42.369 --> 00:34:46.329 conclusion but let's stay here for a moment so 00:34:46.329 --> 00:34:50.010 if the if more magma comes through then the pressure 00:34:50.010 --> 00:34:54.750 increases and the pathway will essentially deform 00:34:54.750 --> 00:34:58.050 it will become more spacious to accommodate that 00:34:58.050 --> 00:35:02.789 new magma and both of these all of these three 00:35:02.789 --> 00:35:05.230 things that we mentioned so flow rate pressure 00:35:06.010 --> 00:35:10.550 And this increase in the size of the conduit 00:35:10.550 --> 00:35:14.130 will propagate upwards and eventually reach the 00:35:14.130 --> 00:35:16.869 shallow magmatic system. And so in the data, 00:35:16.969 --> 00:35:20.349 we see that as an increase in CO2 emission rates, 00:35:20.489 --> 00:35:23.550 like I mentioned before, and also an inflation 00:35:23.550 --> 00:35:28.210 of the shallow magma chambers. So there's a lot 00:35:28.210 --> 00:35:31.869 of GPS stations on top of the summit and along 00:35:31.869 --> 00:35:34.250 the rift zones of Kilauea that can measure how 00:35:34.250 --> 00:35:37.800 ground moves. And sometimes these stations go 00:35:37.800 --> 00:35:41.639 up, sometimes they go down. And in 2003, correspondingly, 00:35:41.679 --> 00:35:47.159 the GPS stations went up. So the volcano inflated. 00:35:47.260 --> 00:35:51.579 More magma was supplied to these balloons, to 00:35:51.579 --> 00:35:54.820 these magma chambers as it was erupted. And so 00:35:54.820 --> 00:35:59.760 they started to inflate. Yeah. Yeah, that was 00:35:59.760 --> 00:36:02.099 a wild time. I was actually there for the tail 00:36:02.099 --> 00:36:04.380 end of that as a volunteer at the Hawaiian Volcano 00:36:04.380 --> 00:36:07.360 Observatory, taking those differential GPSs, 00:36:07.360 --> 00:36:09.199 I think they're called Leica systems, and you 00:36:09.199 --> 00:36:10.860 have them on these little tripods with little 00:36:10.860 --> 00:36:13.059 buttons so you can quickly level them. And so 00:36:13.059 --> 00:36:17.329 one of these shallow events... did or a di event 00:36:17.329 --> 00:36:21.489 would start and uh i don't know why but uh mike 00:36:21.489 --> 00:36:25.190 poland who's now the scientist in chief at yellowstone 00:36:25.190 --> 00:36:28.570 observatory he was the geodisy person at hbo 00:36:28.570 --> 00:36:31.610 at the time he trusted me to be able to gather 00:36:31.610 --> 00:36:34.250 the gear up and go by myself into the caldera 00:36:34.250 --> 00:36:37.070 and just start like running through all the benchmarks 00:36:37.070 --> 00:36:39.130 with these to try to capture these events to 00:36:39.130 --> 00:36:42.309 try to help with the the permanent stations so 00:36:42.309 --> 00:36:46.480 that was uh really interesting A fun time for 00:36:46.480 --> 00:36:49.539 sure. And it was really like, I don't know how 00:36:49.539 --> 00:36:52.639 to describe it, but I always like as a young, 00:36:52.739 --> 00:36:56.679 hopefully to be in grad school at the time, I 00:36:56.679 --> 00:36:59.280 just kind of, I knew that the volcano had changed 00:36:59.280 --> 00:37:02.559 over time. So like you could go before Pu 'u 00:37:02.559 --> 00:37:05.059 O 'o and Kilauea wouldn't erupt for a few years 00:37:05.059 --> 00:37:08.380 and then it would have these fairly, well, large 00:37:08.380 --> 00:37:11.059 for Kilauea eruptions and you had Mauna Ulu in 00:37:11.059 --> 00:37:13.500 the 60s and then... Pu 'u O 'o started and then 00:37:13.500 --> 00:37:17.000 it was just constantly erupting. So to kind of 00:37:17.000 --> 00:37:20.019 track back this a little, probably way further 00:37:20.019 --> 00:37:23.579 than your paper, really, can you look through 00:37:23.579 --> 00:37:27.679 time, even though we don't have the CO2 measurements 00:37:27.679 --> 00:37:30.960 required, but could you go back casting to see 00:37:30.960 --> 00:37:34.679 how some of these events may or may not have 00:37:34.679 --> 00:37:39.039 been affected by deeper processes? Well, that's 00:37:39.039 --> 00:37:41.039 a very good question. One thing I want to say, 00:37:41.599 --> 00:37:44.019 it's probably not answering your question, but 00:37:44.019 --> 00:37:46.500 I think it's needed first, is that we forgot 00:37:46.500 --> 00:37:48.539 to mention one important thing, which is that 00:37:48.539 --> 00:37:52.380 this change that happened in 2003 happened during 00:37:52.380 --> 00:37:56.019 a period that was extremely stable. So as you 00:37:56.019 --> 00:37:58.300 mentioned... All of Pu 'u O 'o's eruptions were 00:37:58.300 --> 00:38:00.739 really stable. Like for 30 years, it was pretty 00:38:00.739 --> 00:38:04.440 stable. Exactly. But on the ground, you didn't 00:38:04.440 --> 00:38:06.280 notice that, though. You can only really see 00:38:06.280 --> 00:38:08.119 how stable it was when you have the chance to 00:38:08.119 --> 00:38:10.800 step back and look. Exactly. Because when you're 00:38:10.800 --> 00:38:13.219 on the ground, there's all the shallow activity 00:38:13.219 --> 00:38:15.420 that's happening. That's true. And it's constant. 00:38:15.519 --> 00:38:17.920 You get earthquake swarms. You're getting inflation, 00:38:18.179 --> 00:38:21.380 deflation events. You're getting south. You're 00:38:21.380 --> 00:38:24.920 getting the south where you're having this constant 00:38:24.920 --> 00:38:27.340 slip along the decalment plane, which I'm adding 00:38:27.340 --> 00:38:30.880 more terminology, basically. Kilauea has a mobile 00:38:30.880 --> 00:38:33.920 south flank, and occasionally you're going to 00:38:33.920 --> 00:38:35.800 get intrusions into there. And all of this is 00:38:35.800 --> 00:38:39.219 happening at the same time as these deeper sources. 00:38:39.440 --> 00:38:42.119 So on the ground, I guarantee you there was some 00:38:42.119 --> 00:38:44.840 chatter in the background about increasing CO2 00:38:44.840 --> 00:38:47.840 and stuff. But the day -to -day science just 00:38:47.840 --> 00:38:49.719 kept rolling, and nobody really gave it too much 00:38:49.719 --> 00:38:52.760 of a thought until you could look back. Yeah, 00:38:52.900 --> 00:38:55.460 that's true. Yeah, because, yeah, as you said, 00:38:55.699 --> 00:38:58.969 the scales matter a lot. If you're sitting there 00:38:58.969 --> 00:39:02.090 like you were, you would have probably felt a 00:39:02.090 --> 00:39:05.769 lot of changes. Oh, yeah. If you zoom out at 00:39:05.769 --> 00:39:09.610 the lithospheric scale, which nobody can until 00:39:09.610 --> 00:39:13.150 we actually get the data, you would have probably 00:39:13.150 --> 00:39:16.050 noticed, oh, actually things were not that crazy 00:39:16.050 --> 00:39:19.150 as I thought. Well, it depends on what your scale 00:39:19.150 --> 00:39:21.190 is, because if you're thinking about like, oh, 00:39:21.210 --> 00:39:24.420 yeah, we're going through the prairies. in north 00:39:24.420 --> 00:39:27.679 america over to kilauea and all of a sudden you're 00:39:27.679 --> 00:39:31.179 like wow so this was like a fairly large hill 00:39:31.179 --> 00:39:33.300 and now it's a giant hole in the ground yeah 00:39:33.300 --> 00:39:35.960 what happened to you like you know like the the 00:39:35.960 --> 00:39:40.099 drastic changes there over the times that i've 00:39:40.099 --> 00:39:44.159 been there like holy smokes yeah yeah it's crazy 00:39:45.039 --> 00:39:47.679 To answer your question, you can actually backtrack 00:39:47.679 --> 00:39:51.199 changes in magma supply rate even when you don't 00:39:51.199 --> 00:39:55.119 have CO2 emission rates. Because at the end of 00:39:55.119 --> 00:39:57.280 the day, it's a mass balance problem, right? 00:39:57.400 --> 00:40:01.840 The mass that comes in the shallow reservoirs 00:40:01.840 --> 00:40:05.699 is equal to the mass that comes out plus the 00:40:05.699 --> 00:40:08.280 change in the mass in the shallow reservoirs. 00:40:08.320 --> 00:40:12.300 Over long time scales. That's true. That's true. 00:40:12.380 --> 00:40:14.780 You can't do it over the course of a year. Yeah, 00:40:14.860 --> 00:40:18.579 that's how they would estimate supply rate in 00:40:18.579 --> 00:40:20.920 the absence of CO2 emission rates. So you have 00:40:20.920 --> 00:40:24.099 to average it over a longer timescale. It cannot 00:40:24.099 --> 00:40:28.039 be a measurement that you make at the scale of 00:40:28.039 --> 00:40:30.760 the individual CO2 emission rate measurements. 00:40:31.000 --> 00:40:33.659 Right. But you can have estimates over longer 00:40:33.659 --> 00:40:36.840 periods of time. All right. Well, we've had a 00:40:36.840 --> 00:40:40.960 meandering tale of... Kilauea's magmatic system, 00:40:41.119 --> 00:40:43.860 which I'm so glad you came on the podcast for. 00:40:43.980 --> 00:40:46.900 I am totally nerding out over all of it. But 00:40:46.900 --> 00:40:53.679 how does that fit in with today's activity? We're 00:40:53.679 --> 00:40:56.039 back to that same steady state that was there 00:40:56.039 --> 00:40:59.099 before 2003, or are we at a different level? 00:41:00.360 --> 00:41:05.059 Well, this is very interesting. There seems to 00:41:05.059 --> 00:41:07.800 be a steady state right now. The eruption is 00:41:07.800 --> 00:41:11.380 very interesting because it's clearly periodic. 00:41:12.000 --> 00:41:15.719 It erupts, the volcano erupts for a few hours, 00:41:15.960 --> 00:41:20.079 and then it doesn't erupt for a few days, and 00:41:20.079 --> 00:41:23.360 then it erupts again. So it seems like it's very 00:41:23.360 --> 00:41:27.820 irregular, but in reality, if you average over 00:41:27.820 --> 00:41:30.300 a long time period, there seems to be a balance 00:41:30.300 --> 00:41:32.679 between what's supplied and what is erupted. 00:41:32.940 --> 00:41:37.110 So there seems to be actually some sort of statistical 00:41:37.110 --> 00:41:41.170 steady state meaning that over a short time span 00:41:41.170 --> 00:41:45.489 it's things seems to be very very dynamic and 00:41:45.489 --> 00:41:47.789 changing quite quickly but if you average them 00:41:47.789 --> 00:41:51.449 over a longer time then they're actually not 00:41:51.449 --> 00:41:55.250 changing a lot so if we go a little bit back 00:41:55.250 --> 00:41:58.989 in time and see how we got here this in 2003 00:41:58.989 --> 00:42:01.550 there was this big change there was more magma 00:42:01.550 --> 00:42:03.849 being supplied to the volcano and that drove 00:42:03.849 --> 00:42:08.159 a series of changes in the shallow magmatic system. 00:42:08.400 --> 00:42:11.900 There was a big eruption in 2007, then the volcano 00:42:11.900 --> 00:42:15.340 started inflating again dramatically up until 00:42:15.340 --> 00:42:19.320 2018 where the big eruption in the lower East 00:42:19.320 --> 00:42:22.940 Rift Zone happened that most people remember. 00:42:23.519 --> 00:42:29.159 So for me the main upshot of this paper and what 00:42:29.159 --> 00:42:33.119 we tried to convey is that there's a very big 00:42:33.119 --> 00:42:36.889 difference in behavior. from processes that occur 00:42:36.889 --> 00:42:40.730 at the bottom and then propagate to the top and 00:42:40.730 --> 00:42:44.909 processes that happen at the top so if we think 00:42:44.909 --> 00:42:46.909 of what we were talking about before the fact 00:42:46.909 --> 00:42:49.730 that if you have more magma being supplied then 00:42:49.730 --> 00:42:53.809 the pressure increases and the size of the conduit 00:42:53.809 --> 00:42:56.730 increases okay so if you increase the pressure 00:42:56.730 --> 00:43:00.369 and you increase the size at depth both of these 00:43:00.369 --> 00:43:04.429 processes have the effect of increasing the rate 00:43:04.429 --> 00:43:07.690 at which magma ascends through this conduit because 00:43:07.690 --> 00:43:10.030 you're increasing the driving force which is 00:43:10.030 --> 00:43:12.550 the pressure and you're increasing the size of 00:43:12.550 --> 00:43:15.070 this pathway and so you have a lot more magma 00:43:15.070 --> 00:43:18.329 coming through so any change at the bottom will 00:43:18.329 --> 00:43:21.610 significantly affect the top on the other hand 00:43:21.610 --> 00:43:24.869 at the top we have sort of a negative feedback 00:43:24.869 --> 00:43:28.690 so if we change the pressure at the top let's 00:43:28.690 --> 00:43:32.130 say we increase it we are reducing the pressure 00:43:32.130 --> 00:43:35.110 the driving force because now there's a lower 00:43:35.110 --> 00:43:37.969 pressure difference to drive the flow. But we 00:43:37.969 --> 00:43:41.010 are also increasing the size of the conduit again. 00:43:41.230 --> 00:43:43.989 And so these two processes actually compensate 00:43:43.989 --> 00:43:48.070 each other. And they do not result in big changes 00:43:48.070 --> 00:43:51.849 in magma supply rate. So why is this important? 00:43:52.030 --> 00:43:55.909 For example, in 2018, there was a big eruption. 00:43:56.670 --> 00:44:01.489 People think that the summit reservoirs decompressed 00:44:01.489 --> 00:44:06.269 of about... 20 megapascals. There's a lot. It's 00:44:06.269 --> 00:44:09.309 a lot of magma being evacuated and it's a lot 00:44:09.309 --> 00:44:12.590 of decrease in pressure. And so everyone was 00:44:12.590 --> 00:44:16.329 expecting something to happen. A new increase 00:44:16.329 --> 00:44:18.969 in magma supply because we have now decreased 00:44:18.969 --> 00:44:21.730 the pressure at the top and so we can drive more 00:44:21.730 --> 00:44:26.329 magma in. But in reality, gravity measurements 00:44:26.329 --> 00:44:29.250 that have been conducted after the eruption didn't 00:44:29.250 --> 00:44:32.650 really show any change. And so this conceptual 00:44:32.650 --> 00:44:36.750 model of pressure changes being associated with 00:44:36.750 --> 00:44:39.550 changes in the size of the pathway and that leading 00:44:39.550 --> 00:44:42.630 to a difference between bottom -up processes 00:44:42.630 --> 00:44:45.909 and top -down processes can reconcile the fact 00:44:45.909 --> 00:44:49.090 that there were no changes observed in the rate 00:44:49.090 --> 00:44:51.309 at which magma was supplied to the volcano after 00:44:51.309 --> 00:44:54.750 2018. Crazy. I just had a random thought that 00:44:54.750 --> 00:44:57.309 came to me and it's probably useless, but this 00:44:57.309 --> 00:44:59.730 is how I conduct science and also my life, which 00:44:59.730 --> 00:45:02.250 drives people crazy. I throw darts at a dartboard 00:45:02.250 --> 00:45:05.550 and more than half the ideas are bad or wrong. 00:45:05.829 --> 00:45:08.969 But is there any way that this process is that 00:45:08.969 --> 00:45:11.210 you're describing about creating this pathway 00:45:11.210 --> 00:45:15.440 and having it? you said elastically deform to 00:45:15.440 --> 00:45:18.460 open a little wider is it any possibility that 00:45:18.460 --> 00:45:21.260 some of these deformations become more permanent 00:45:21.260 --> 00:45:24.239 like it can't fully go back to the same shape 00:45:24.239 --> 00:45:28.099 which if you think about it if they have to stay 00:45:28.099 --> 00:45:30.780 steady state and now the whole thing is a little 00:45:30.780 --> 00:45:35.309 bit bigger you're potentially increasing the 00:45:35.309 --> 00:45:39.130 magma flow rate or the magma supply rate to the 00:45:39.130 --> 00:45:41.670 volcano. We've always had this problem of trying 00:45:41.670 --> 00:45:45.250 to understand why Mauna Loa, Mauna Kea, Kilauea 00:45:45.250 --> 00:45:50.789 are all so large. How did their magma supply 00:45:50.789 --> 00:45:53.250 increase to the point where they can actually 00:45:53.250 --> 00:45:56.730 get that big? So is there a mechanism here that 00:45:56.730 --> 00:45:59.469 as it continues to open up, it just continues 00:45:59.469 --> 00:46:03.250 to add more supply? Yeah, I think there could 00:46:03.250 --> 00:46:05.329 be. I mean, this is a very interesting question 00:46:05.329 --> 00:46:07.610 and something that I would like to actually pursue 00:46:07.610 --> 00:46:11.989 in the future. As we mentioned before, what I 00:46:11.989 --> 00:46:14.590 considered in this particular case was a purely 00:46:14.590 --> 00:46:18.110 elastic response. So as the pressure went back 00:46:18.110 --> 00:46:21.269 to what it was before this change in magma supply 00:46:21.269 --> 00:46:24.369 rate, then the shape of the conduit also went 00:46:24.369 --> 00:46:27.489 back. But that was also because the changes occurred 00:46:27.489 --> 00:46:31.960 in a short time relative to the... relaxation 00:46:31.960 --> 00:46:36.780 time of of the rocks but if this relaxation time 00:46:36.780 --> 00:46:38.820 is just for everyone else is like the ability 00:46:38.820 --> 00:46:42.059 to come back to the same shape so if your relaxation 00:46:42.059 --> 00:46:45.090 time is a lot longer that means to come back 00:46:45.090 --> 00:46:48.710 to that same shape takes a lot longer so like 00:46:48.710 --> 00:46:51.670 a billiard ball the reaction time is like instantaneously 00:46:51.670 --> 00:46:54.070 whereas this is obviously going to have some 00:46:54.070 --> 00:46:56.909 time to flow back if you want to say it in a 00:46:56.909 --> 00:46:59.469 viscosity sense to its original shape sorry i 00:46:59.469 --> 00:47:01.130 just didn't think anybody was following along 00:47:01.130 --> 00:47:05.170 just in case no no exactly and uh and sometimes 00:47:05.170 --> 00:47:08.050 the response of a material can be different according 00:47:08.050 --> 00:47:14.550 to the how fast the force is applied to that 00:47:14.550 --> 00:47:18.070 material. If I apply a force very fast to silly 00:47:18.070 --> 00:47:20.630 putty, it will deform in an elastic way. But 00:47:20.630 --> 00:47:23.090 if I apply it slowly, then it will flow. And 00:47:23.090 --> 00:47:26.730 this is also true for earth materials. So the 00:47:26.730 --> 00:47:28.929 deformation that we're talking about here happened 00:47:28.929 --> 00:47:34.489 over a few years. And given the possible viscosity 00:47:34.489 --> 00:47:38.369 range of rocks there at depth, even if they're 00:47:38.369 --> 00:47:42.119 hot, an elastic response is reasonable. But if 00:47:42.119 --> 00:47:45.780 those changes happened over a longer timescale, 00:47:45.920 --> 00:47:49.000 then it would be more reasonable to assume that 00:47:49.000 --> 00:47:52.019 there's also a viscoelastic component, a viscous 00:47:52.019 --> 00:47:56.719 component. So viscous component is non -recoverable. 00:47:57.320 --> 00:48:00.059 Once you deform something, it stays that way. 00:48:00.119 --> 00:48:03.000 It cannot go back. And so I think that answers 00:48:03.000 --> 00:48:07.380 your question. It definitely can. You can have 00:48:07.380 --> 00:48:11.420 deformations that will alter. the shape of this 00:48:11.420 --> 00:48:15.380 conduit and therefore supply of magma over long 00:48:15.380 --> 00:48:20.239 time scales. Wow. So I guess that's where the 00:48:20.239 --> 00:48:23.559 future of this will go. I mean, you said this 00:48:23.559 --> 00:48:26.380 is an avenue that you want to investigate a bit 00:48:26.380 --> 00:48:30.639 further. So is that... Yeah. Yeah, I would really 00:48:30.639 --> 00:48:34.539 like to. Like you said before, the puzzling thing 00:48:34.539 --> 00:48:37.849 about thinking of... any other solution to the 00:48:37.849 --> 00:48:40.690 problem of how this pathway stays open is that 00:48:40.690 --> 00:48:43.750 you need to be on in a steady state because over 00:48:43.750 --> 00:48:45.769 the time scales that we've observed it seems 00:48:45.769 --> 00:48:49.309 that the volcano is sort of behaving very stably 00:48:49.309 --> 00:48:52.010 so i really want to go a little bit deeper into 00:48:52.010 --> 00:48:57.250 the the problem of coupling the flow of magma 00:48:57.250 --> 00:49:01.130 with the heat that the magma is moving around 00:49:01.130 --> 00:49:04.269 and losing by conduction to the surrounding rocks 00:49:05.210 --> 00:49:08.269 How is it possible that we are in such a steady 00:49:08.269 --> 00:49:11.309 state, even though there's so many things going 00:49:11.309 --> 00:49:14.170 on at the same time, including, again, changes 00:49:14.170 --> 00:49:17.130 in the flow rate, which will drive changes in 00:49:17.130 --> 00:49:19.710 the rate at which heat is transferred through 00:49:19.710 --> 00:49:22.050 the system? So I would really like to address 00:49:22.050 --> 00:49:24.590 that in the future. It's definitely on my bucket 00:49:24.590 --> 00:49:26.969 list. Yeah, and if you somehow manage to link 00:49:26.969 --> 00:49:30.730 that to long -term magma supply rate, changing 00:49:30.730 --> 00:49:33.409 the shape of that, that's a nature paper or a 00:49:33.409 --> 00:49:36.989 science paper, my friend. Yeah, yeah. And also... 00:49:36.989 --> 00:49:38.530 If you manage it, you've got to come back on 00:49:38.530 --> 00:49:41.230 to talk about it, though, okay? Oh, 100%. 100%. 00:49:41.230 --> 00:49:45.010 I will. Yeah. And another question that I really 00:49:45.010 --> 00:49:47.530 find interesting is that we've been talking about 00:49:47.530 --> 00:49:50.250 this change that happened in 2003, right? And 00:49:50.250 --> 00:49:53.949 we've just been assuming that it's more magma 00:49:53.949 --> 00:49:56.130 coming into the system, but actually we don't 00:49:56.130 --> 00:49:58.309 really know why there was more magma coming in 00:49:58.309 --> 00:50:01.329 the system, right? If for 30 years things had 00:50:01.329 --> 00:50:07.030 been quite stable, What changed in 2003 that 00:50:07.030 --> 00:50:10.929 drove those transient modifications to the system? 00:50:11.070 --> 00:50:14.389 Was there simply more magma being produced because 00:50:14.389 --> 00:50:17.989 maybe it was hotter? Maybe a new portion of the 00:50:17.989 --> 00:50:21.110 pathway connected to the main pathway and released 00:50:21.110 --> 00:50:24.150 a pulse of magma that then ascended towards the 00:50:24.150 --> 00:50:26.989 surface? Those are really interesting questions 00:50:26.989 --> 00:50:30.050 for me, but they are still open. And it's harder 00:50:30.050 --> 00:50:32.920 to constrain because... again like you mentioned 00:50:32.920 --> 00:50:35.500 we cannot really see down there so there's only 00:50:35.500 --> 00:50:38.599 so much that we can say yeah all we have is the 00:50:38.599 --> 00:50:41.519 chemistry of the rocks that come out yeah okay 00:50:41.519 --> 00:50:46.159 well uh i guess it's call out time because we 00:50:46.159 --> 00:50:50.500 yeah future work colleagues whatever you want 00:50:50.500 --> 00:50:52.280 however you want to wrap this together before 00:50:52.280 --> 00:50:56.380 we hit the infamous last question okay okay well 00:50:56.380 --> 00:50:59.079 uh again like i mentioned at the opening this 00:50:59.079 --> 00:51:03.760 is This was my first podcast, so I feel I should 00:51:03.760 --> 00:51:08.039 do a shout -out to my parents, who will not be 00:51:08.039 --> 00:51:11.579 able to understand this because they don't speak 00:51:11.579 --> 00:51:14.159 English. But I'll definitely translate it for 00:51:14.159 --> 00:51:16.019 them and let them know that I mentioned them 00:51:16.019 --> 00:51:19.019 on that. This is a good segue here because, actually, 00:51:19.059 --> 00:51:21.679 if you go to YouTube, because you can send it 00:51:21.679 --> 00:51:23.360 out on YouTube, and because I have a transcript, 00:51:23.679 --> 00:51:27.119 you can actually do the closed captioning in 00:51:27.119 --> 00:51:29.519 a whole bunch of different languages. Okay, that's 00:51:29.519 --> 00:51:31.840 great. It does it automatically. I have looked 00:51:31.840 --> 00:51:34.900 at this because my wife speaks Farsi, and so 00:51:34.900 --> 00:51:38.639 it does translate it to Farsi. So they can understand 00:51:38.639 --> 00:51:42.400 it. I cannot because I get automatic transcripts. 00:51:42.400 --> 00:51:45.000 I don't go hand -edit them, so maybe the translation 00:51:45.000 --> 00:51:47.820 may be missing in a few spots. But nevertheless, 00:51:48.039 --> 00:51:50.860 you can do that. this is great this is great 00:51:50.860 --> 00:51:53.239 because they're very curious about my work but 00:51:53.239 --> 00:51:55.739 of course you know i write in english my papers 00:51:55.739 --> 00:51:58.460 are in english and you know it takes some effort 00:51:58.460 --> 00:52:02.119 to translate everything and so yeah this is amazing 00:52:02.119 --> 00:52:05.460 so shout out to my parents i'll uh i'm happy 00:52:05.460 --> 00:52:08.460 that you will finally be able to uh to hear me 00:52:08.460 --> 00:52:12.139 in uh or to understand what i say in italian 00:52:12.139 --> 00:52:17.730 yeah amazing yeah uh i guess There's people that 00:52:17.730 --> 00:52:19.829 listen to this podcast all over the world. And 00:52:19.829 --> 00:52:22.449 so if you want your friend to follow along, maybe 00:52:22.449 --> 00:52:24.730 the closed captioning is the way to go. I don't 00:52:24.730 --> 00:52:26.289 know. I don't think I'll be translating this 00:52:26.289 --> 00:52:29.050 into other languages. Yeah, that takes a lot 00:52:29.050 --> 00:52:32.309 of effort. Yeah, well, AI is getting pretty good. 00:52:32.469 --> 00:52:36.289 Yeah, that's true. But I don't know. A problem 00:52:36.289 --> 00:52:38.570 for another time, because we've come to the last 00:52:38.570 --> 00:52:42.190 question. The one I ask every guest, and if a 00:52:42.190 --> 00:52:44.070 guest comes on twice, they'll have to come up. 00:52:44.320 --> 00:52:48.880 ideally with a new joke what yeah is your favorite 00:52:48.880 --> 00:52:55.699 science joke so when okay i'll tell you this 00:52:55.699 --> 00:52:58.539 this is a joke that i heard in my grad school 00:52:58.539 --> 00:53:04.500 geodynamics class it's very short so uh someone 00:53:04.500 --> 00:53:09.659 asks a geophysicist or a geodynamicist they ask 00:53:09.659 --> 00:53:13.559 them what's up And the geodynamicist answers, 00:53:14.039 --> 00:53:21.820 well, perpendicular to the geoid. Oh, my goodness. 00:53:22.280 --> 00:53:25.420 For those that are not following along, the geoid 00:53:25.420 --> 00:53:30.340 is a way of mapping the mean sea level. It's 00:53:30.340 --> 00:53:33.980 the lines of equal potential energy of the gravitational 00:53:33.980 --> 00:53:37.179 field, which can deviate in different spots that 00:53:37.179 --> 00:53:39.039 doesn't have to be parallel to the ground surface. 00:53:39.280 --> 00:53:42.219 And so what is up? perpendicular to those lines 00:53:42.219 --> 00:53:45.280 of equal potential energy. Yeah, I thought you'd 00:53:45.280 --> 00:53:48.300 appreciate it. I did. You've done work on gravity. 00:53:48.460 --> 00:53:55.079 That was awesome. Know your host. Okay, well, 00:53:55.199 --> 00:53:58.280 thank you so much for coming on. And absolutely, 00:53:58.420 --> 00:54:02.300 if you get into the weeds and further down this 00:54:02.300 --> 00:54:04.800 rabbit hole and produce another paper, reach 00:54:04.800 --> 00:54:07.980 out. I'd happily have you back on. Thank you 00:54:07.980 --> 00:54:09.820 so much. It was great to be there. Thank you, 00:54:09.820 --> 00:54:13.460 Jeff. That was a real treat. Hopefully for you 00:54:13.460 --> 00:54:15.599 as well. It was great to reminisce a little bit 00:54:15.599 --> 00:54:19.380 about Hawaii and get into some brand new research. 00:54:20.360 --> 00:54:24.500 Awesome. Just awesome. Alright, there will be 00:54:24.500 --> 00:54:27.599 more news about the end of Season 2 as we move 00:54:27.599 --> 00:54:30.699 a little further forward. And I'll see you guys 00:54:30.699 --> 00:54:38.739 in two weeks. So chaotic, so misbehaved Echoes 00:54:38.739 --> 00:54:45.500 of melodies remind us it's always Colors weave 00:54:45.500 --> 00:54:52.559 stories painting the sky Swaying to rhythms as 00:54:52.559 --> 00:55:13.300 the galaxies fly by our bones through this melodic 00:55:13.300 --> 00:55:18.760 maze our minds explore change