Absence of surface volcanism and the indeterminate evidence for continental mantle plumes

There are rare occurrences on Earth where mantle plumes intersect with continents, resulting in surface volcanism.Unlike their more common counterparts in oceanic lithosphere, where the ascent of melts is facilitated by a thinner lithosphere, identifying continental plumes is challenging. Surface volcanism, traditionally a key indicator of mantle plumes, may play a diminished role in regions characterized by complex tectonics and variations in lithospheric thickness.

Eastern Oman provides an excellent example where a continental mantle plume has remained undetected due to the absence of current surface volcanism. The region exhibits evidence of intraplate basanites, although with an age of ~35-40 Ma. Given their geochemical signature, these alkaline rocks likely originated from a mixture of melts from a plume-derived source and those from a lithosphere-derived component. Using P- and S-wave arrival-time residuals from distant earthquakes, we image a new mantle plume in eastern Oman, which we name the Salma plume. This continental plume is revealed in our 3-D P- and S-wave tomographic models as a 200 km low-velocity conduit extending to at least the base of the upper mantle, and located below the area of Tertiary intraplate volcanism. Despite experiencing minimal shortening since the Paleogene, the shallow-marine sediments of the Salma Plateau in eastern Oman reach elevations exceeding 2000 meters. Ongoing uplift, indicated by elevated Quaternary marine terraces, suggests that the plateau is still rising. The present uplift rate is modest but maps of residual topography show a positive trend in eastern Oman that can be associated to the presence of a plume.

Incorporating a geodynamic perspective, our analysis of noise-mitigated Indian plate motion relative to Somalia reveals that India underwent a constant-velocity reorientation of approximately 15˚  from 48 to 30 Ma, concurrent with the arrival of the plume head beneath eastern Oman. We quantitatively demonstrate that increased asthenospheric flow induced by the plume flux in eastern Oman, adjacent to the Indian plate in the Eocene, may be responsible for deflecting the Indian plate path, as indicated in kinematic reconstructions.

The consequence of ignoring a plume in Oman is that we were unable to understand many of the enigmatic observations from plume impingement at ~40 Ma. Our study underscores the potential of combining seismology, geology, geochemistry, and geodynamics to be a more effective approach for detecting continental plumes than relying solely on surface volcanism, and has transformed our understanding of the tectonic evolution of the area and beyond.