William Nelson

University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa | UH Manoa · Department of Earth Sciences

The magma ocean concept was first conceived to explain the geology of the Moon, but hemispherical or global oceans of silicate melt could be a widespread lava world” phase of rocky planet accretion, and could persist on planets on short-period orbits around other stars. The formation and crystallization of magma oceans could be a defining stage in...

The evolution of the lunar interior is constrained by samples of the magnesian suite of rocks returned by the Apollo missions. Reconciling the paradoxical geochemical features of this suite constitutes a feasibility test of lunar differentiation models. Here we present the results of a microanalytical examination of the archetypal specimen, troctol...

Diffusion chronometry has gained increasing use in the past couple of decades as a tool to investigate timescales of geologic processes. It is a flexible technique that can be applied if the process of interest generates a concentration gradient and the rate at which a species (e.g., element, ion, molecule, etc.) diffuses to homogenize the gradient...

The magma ocean concept was first conceived to explain the geology of the Moon, but hemispherical or global oceans of silicate melt could be a widespread "lava world" phase of rocky planet accretion, and could persist on planets on short-period orbits around other stars. The formation and crystallization of magma oceans could be a defining stage in...

Interactions between fluid lava and the ocean can be explosive and thus hazardous to nearby communities. These eruptions can be difficult to study as at least half of the deposit is lost to the sea. During 2008, lava flows from episode 58 of Puʻu ʻŌʻō entered the ocean near the town of Kalapana. The deposits are well-preserved, not covered by subse...