Physical and chemical interaction in the interior of the Caledonian mountains of Norway

Abstract

Four hundred million years ago, rocks that are found along the present day Norwegian coast were situated in the deep root underneath a huge mountain range. Through movements of the Earth’s crust that are caused by stresses in combination with erosion these rocks became exposed on the Earth’s surface, and it is therefore possible to study the physical and chemical processes that took place in the interior of the so called Caledonian mountain range in these rocks. The study of these processes presented in this dissertation has been evaluated by the adjudication committee as ‘novel and provocative’ and is of major importance for the progress in understanding the formation of mountain ranges.

The physics and chemistry of the rock forming processes have been studied in detail in some very rare garnet peridotite and eclogite rocks that are found by the author in an outcrop along the Norwegian coast, northwest of Molde. The series of articles collected in this dissertation describes several discoveries including very small (0.001 mm) diamonds. Furthermore, it describes in detail the fluid and melt processes that took place at high pressure in the deep root of the mountain. The dissertation also presents an alternative model for the formation of the type of rocks described, which contrasts strongly with the presently accepted views, but that better explains the presented observations and measurements.

The work presented in the dissertation was carried out at ‘Physics of Geological Processes’ at the University of Oslo in collaboration with the Utrecht University, the VU University in Amsterdam and the Museum of Natural History in Paris and included a wide range of techniques to analyze the mineral composition, chemistry and structures of the rocks combined with mathematical techniques in order to find out how the rocks formed.