Zircon Xenocrysts From Easter Island (Rapa Nui) Reveal Hotspot Activity Since the Middle Jurassic

Abstract

We report the finding of mantle-derived zircon grains retrieved from red soils, regoliths, and beach sands from Easter Island, that are much older than the island volcanism (0–2.5 Ma) and its underlying lithosphere (Pliocene, 3–4.8 Ma). A large population of 0–165 Ma old zircons have coherent oxygen (δ18O 3.8–5.9‰) and hafnium (εHf(t)+3.5–+12.5) mantle isotopic signatures. These results are consistent with the crystallization of zircon from plume-related melts. In addition, a chemically diverse population with ages from the Paleozoic to the Archean was found. These older populations are enigmatic but they could represent remnants of ancient subducted sediments. Meanwhile, the ∼0–165 Ma population is interpreted as plume-derived, suggesting that the hotspot started at least ∼165 Ma ago. A spike of ∼164–160 Ma zircons could represent a Large Igneous Province (LIP) stage upon the first arrival of the plume. We use plate reconstructions to show that such a LIP would have formed on the Phoenix Plate and would have subducted below the Antarctic Peninsula around 100–105 Ma. There, LIP subduction would offer a solution for the enigmatic Palmer Land deformation event, previously proposed to result from a collision with an unknown indenter. The here-reported “ghost” of a prolonged hotspot activity suggests that fragments of the Easter plume and of the ambient sub-lithospheric mantle stored and re-sampled zircon xenocrysts due to convective (re)circulation at the scale of the plume head. Our study demonstrates how zircon geochronology and geochemistry provide novel insights into global-scale geodynamics, offering new perspectives on the dynamics of mantle plumes and hotspot activity.