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New Volcano Off Mayotte Reveals Hadean Mantle Material in Lava Samples
@NewScientist reported that lava from Fani Maoré volcano shows elevated neodymium-142 ratios indicating preserved material from Earth's primordial magma ocean. The findings come from samples collected after the volcano's discovery in 2018. Researchers used precise isotope measurements to identify the ancient reservoir.
Jul 8, 7:10 AM·1m read1 source
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Lava from the submarine volcano Fani Maoré contains chemical traces of material from Earth's Hadean eon more than 4 billion years ago. @NewScientist reported that samples recovered from the volcano, discovered 50 km east of Mayotte after an earthquake swarm began in May 2018, showed a higher ratio of neodymium-142 to neodymium-144 than lava from the older Mayotte volcanic system.
Eruptions at Fani Maoré between 2018 and 2021 caused Mayotte to subside by about 20 cm.
Catherine Chauvel of the French National Centre for Scientific Research led the analysis with Claudine Israel of the University of Cambridge, applying an ultra-precise technique to measure the isotope ratios in rocks from both the new volcano and the pre-existing Mayotte system.
The elevated ratio points to a mantle reservoir enriched in bridgmanite that escaped convective mixing for billions of years. The study, published in Nature with DOI 10.1038/s41586-026-10719-w, concludes that Earth's mantle retains chemically heterogeneous material dating to the Hadean eon when a global magma ocean formed after a Mars-sized impact.
Submarine relief maps from the 2019 MAYOBS2 campaign first revealed the volcano. Tim Johnson of Curtin University, Bernard Bourdon of CNRS in Lyon, and Richard Carlson of Carnegie Science reviewed the work and noted the technical achievement in detecting the preserved crystallization record.
