Moho transition zone in the Cretaceous Andaman ophiolite, India: A passage from the mantle to the crust

Abstract We examined the composition and lithological variability from a road section in south-Andaman which represents a pathway to the crustal section of the Cretaceous Andaman ophiolite. Like other well-studied ophiolites worldwide this transition zone is marked by association of olivine-rich troctolite, wehrlite, pyroxenite and gabbroic rocks. The mineral chemical variations document the evolution of this zone by melt–mantle interaction and fractional crystallization. Petrographic evidence suggests that water was introduced during the evolution of this transition zone. The olivine-rich troctolites record impregnation of MORB melt into a residual olivine-rich lithology (replacive dunite) that formed by an earlier episode of melt–peridotite interaction at a slow spreading ridge. The clinopyroxenites indicate formation from an extreme clinopyroxene saturated melt that might be genetically linked with the formation of olivine-rich protolith of the troctolitic rocks prior to melt impregnation. The wehrlite crystallized from the melt residual after the formation of clinopyroxenite. The composition of the impregnating melt that transformed the replacive dunite to olivine-rich troctolite is identical to the gabbroic rocks. We conclude that the association of these rock types from south-Andaman provides us with a snapshot of the switch over of geodynamic setting of the Andaman ophiolite (MOR to arc) as preserved presently between north-Andaman in the north and Rutland Island in the south.