This is a three-year project to study included fluids, fluid- rock interactions, and fluid-transport processes associated with rocks of the Continental Deep-Drilling Program (KTB) in the Bavarian Oberpfalz region. The three specific aspects of the drilling project to be addressed are: 1) Characterization of volatile-bearing fluid inclusions (by quantitative laser Raman microspectroscopy and conventional microthermometry); 2) structural characterization and petrologic interpretation of graphite (by laser Raman microspectroscopy and petrographic analysis); and 3) investigation of the chemical evolution of the C-0-H-N fluids, which in come cases culminated in graphite precipitation. The principal investigator's research group is particularly suited to this project because of many previous and ongoing studies, including developing methodologies for: the quantitative Raman analysis of fluid inclusions in the C-O-H-N system; quantifying internal volatile pressures from Raman peak parameters in multi- component C-O-H-N gas/fluid mixtures; and characterizing graphite structures and their associated metamorphic grades from Raman spectral parameters. In addition, evaluations of fluid evolution will be aided by ongoing studies of stable and metastable equilibria in synthetic fluids in the C-O-H system, and by studies of fluid-rock interactions in parts of the Duluth mafic intrusive complex wherein both fluids and lithologies bear strong compositional similarities to those of the KTB.
