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Abstract. In an explosive eruption, the atmospheric column dynamics depend strongly on the mass fraction of gas in the erupting mixture, which is fixed by fragmentation in the volcanic conduit. At fragmentation, gas present in vesicular magmatic liquid gets partitioned between a continuous phase separating magma clasts and a dispersed phase in individual bubbles within the clasts. As regards flow behavior, it is the former, continuous, gas phase which matters, and we show that its amount is determined by the fragment size. Analysis of 25 f•ll deposits and 37 flow deposits demonstrates that ash and pumice populations follow a power law size distribution such that N, the number of fragments with radii larger than r, is given by N • r -D. D values range from 2.9 to 3.9 and are always larger than 3.0 in fall deposits. D values for pyroclastic flow deposits are systematically smaller than those of f•ll deposits. We show that at fragmentation the amount of continuous gas phase is an increasing function of the D value. Large D values cannot be attributed to a single fragmentation event and are due to secondary fragmentation processes. Laboratory experiments on bubbly magma and on solid pumice samples demonstrate that primary breakup leads to D va, lues of 2.54-0.1 and that repeated fragment collisions act to increase the D value. A model for size-dependent refragmentation accounts for the observations. We propose that in a volcanic conduit, fragmentation proceeds as a sequence of events. Primary breakup releases a small amount of gas and is followed by fragment collisions. Due to refragmentation and decompression, both the mass and volume fractions of continuous gas increase. The final D value, and hence the mass fraction of continuous gas at the vent, depends on the time spent between primary fragmentation and eruption out of the vent.

2As part of the European LAGUNA design study on a next-generation neutrino detector, we propose the liquid-scintillator detector LENA (Low Energy Neutrino Astronomy) as a multipurpose neutrino observatory. The outstanding successes of the Borexino and KamLAND experiments demonstrate the large potential of liquid-scintillator detectors in low-energy neutrino physics. Low energy threshold, good energy resolution and efficient background discrimination are inherent to the liquidscintillator technique. A target mass of 50 kt will offer a substantial increase in detection sensitivity.At low energies, the variety of detection channels available in liquid scintillator will allow for an energy-and flavor-resolved analysis of the neutrino burst emitted by a galactic Supernova. Due to target mass and background conditions, LENA will also be sensitive to the faint signal of the Diffuse Supernova Neutrino Background. Solar metallicity, time-variation in the solar neutrino flux and deviations from MSW-LMA survival probabilities can be investigated based on unprecedented statistics. Low background conditions allow to search for dark matter by observing rare annihilation neutrinos. The large number of events expected for geoneutrinos will give valuable information on the abundances of Uranium and Thorium and their relative ratio in the Earth's crust and mantle. Reactor neutrinos enable a high-precision measurement of solar mixing parameters. A strong radioactive or pion decay-at-rest neutrino source can be placed close to the detector to investigate neutrino oscillations for short distances and sub-MeV to MeV energies.At high energies, LENA will provide a new lifetime limit for the SUSY-favored proton decay mode into kaon and antineutrino, surpassing current experimental limits by about one order of magnitude. Recent studies have demonstrated that a reconstruction of momentum and energy of GeV particles is well feasible in liquid scintillator. Monte Carlo studies on the reconstruction of the complex event topologies found for neutrino interactions at multi-GeV energies have shown promising results. If this is confirmed, LENA might serve as far detector in a long-baseline neutrino oscillation experiment currently investigated in LAGUNA-LBNO.3

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Fractional crystallization and partial melting involve relative motion of liquid and solid phases and chemical and thermal interactions between them. To elucidate some physical principles of thermosolutal convection in a reactive porous medium, we describe experiments on the directional solidification of aqueous ammonium chloride solutions. The addition of small amounts of a polymerizing agent permits variation of the solution viscosity independently of thermal conditions, the phase diagram, and permeability. Solutions were cooled from below, and crystallization developed at the base of the tank generating at first a field of thin plumes of light residual fluid, released from the boundary layer at the top of the "mush." The interstitial fluid within the mush also became unstable eventually, the onset of convection occurring when the porous medium Rayleigh number of the mush reached a critical value. This threshold value was found to be 25 at low initial superheat and to decrease with increasing superheat. Local thermodynamic equilibrium between crystals and liquid within the mush coupled the evolution of temperature, composition, and porosity. Convective motions locally caused dissolution and precipitation, and hence fluctuations of porosity developed. Dissolution occurred preferentially in the central parts of upwellings, and the upflow gradually focused, being ultimately channelized into narrow "chimneys" devoid of crystals. All else being equal, the areal density of chimneys was greater the lower the viscosity. Chimney diameter increased with increasing solution viscosity. In the liquid above the growing mush, the convective plumes were very similar to salt fingers. Depending on solution viscosity and temperature gradient, they exhibited a phenomenon of collective instability such that vertical motion was disrupted by wave instabilities. The base plate temperature chosen was above the eutectic, and hence the total amount of crystals at the end of experiments with the same initial composition and the same final temperature was a constant fixed by the phase diagram. The spatial distribution of crystals and the final porosity of the mush were, however, determined by the strength of compositional convection as measured by the porous medium Rayleigh number. When no convection occurred, mush thickness finally became equal to the initial layer thickness, and the system was homogeneous. When compositional convection occurred, the overlying reservoir underwent chemical evolution, and mush growth slowed dramatically. In experiments with progressively lower solution viscosity (and hence more vigorous convection), final mush thickness was progressively less and final porosity lower. Final mush thickness was found to scale with solution viscosity to the power +0.33. During fractional crystallization of magma the effects of compositional convection can be recorded in the chemical and mineralogical features of cumulate rocks. We speculate that fossil chimney structures can be found in the Lower Zone of the Bushveld ultramafi...

The ratio of the volume of vesicles (gas) to that of glass (liquid) in pumice clasts (V G /V L ) reflects the degassing and dynamic history experienced by a magma during an explosive eruption. V G /V L in pumices from a large number of Plinian eruption deposits is shown here to vary by two orders of magnitude, even between pumices at a given level in a deposit. These variations in V G /V L do not correlate with crystallinity or initial water content of the magmas or their eruptive intensities, despite large ranges in these variables. Gas volume ratios of pumices do, however, vary systematically with magma viscosity estimated at the point of fragmentation, and we infer that pumices do not quench at the level of fragmentation but undergo some post-fragmentary evolution. On the timescale of Plinian eruptions, pumices with viscosities ~10 9 Pa s can expand after fragmentation, as long as their bubbles retain gas, at a rate inversely proportional to their viscosity. Once the bubbles connect to form a permeable network and lose their gas, expansion halts and pumices with viscosities ~10 5 Pa s can collapse under the action of surface tension. Textural evidence from bubble sizes and shapes in pumices indicates that both expansion and collapse have taken place. The magnitudes of expansion and collapse, therefore, depend critically on the timing of bubble connectivity relative to the final moment of quenching. We propose that bubbles in different pumices become connected at different times throughout the time span between fragmentation and quenching. After accounting for these effects, we derive new information on the fragmentation process from two characteristics of pumices. The most important is a relatively constant minimum value of V G /V L of F1.78 (64 vol.% vesicularity) in all samples with viscosities 10 5 Pa s. This value is independent of magma composition and thus reflects a property of the eruptive mechanism. The other characteristic is that highly expanded pumices (`85 vol.% vesicularities) are common, which argues against overpressure in bubbles as a mechanism for fragmenting magma. We suggest that magma fragments when it reaches a vesicularity of F64 vol.%, but only if sheared sufficiently strongly. The intensity of shear varies as a function of velocity in the conduit, which is related to overpressure in the chamber, so that changes in overpressure with time are important in controlling the common progression from explosive to effusive activity at volcanoes.

A volcanic edi ce exerts a large load at Earth's surface and modi es the stress eld at depth. We investigate how this a¬ects upward dyke propagation towards the surface. For given edi ce dimensions and pressure conditions in the deep magma source, there is a critical density threshold above which magmas cannot reach the surface. This density threshold is a decreasing function of edi ce height. For edi ce heights in the range 0{3000 m, the density threshold spans the density range of common natural magmas (between 2700 and 2300 kg m ¡3 ). With time, di¬erentiation in a magma chamber generates increasingly evolved magmas with decreasing densities, which favours eruption. However, the edi ce grows simultaneously at the surface, which counterbalances this e¬ect. The general tendency is to gradually prevent more and more evolved magmas from reaching the surface. A volcanic edi ce acts as a magma lter which prevents eruption and a¬ects the chemical evolution of the chamber through its control on magma withdrawal. Thus, one may not consider that eruption products are random samples of an evolving magma reservoir. The partial destruction of an edi ce may lead to renewed eruption of primitive and dense magmas.