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22–25 Oct. GSA 2017 Annual Meeting & Exposition JULY 2017 | VOL. 27, NO. 7 NO. 27, | VOL. 2017 JULY A PUBLICATION OF THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF AMERICA® JULY 2017 | VOLUME 27, NUMBER 7 SCIENCE 4 Extracting Bulk Rock Properties from Microscale Measurements: Subsampling and Analytical Guidelines M.C. McCanta, M.D. Dyar, and P.A. Dobosh GSA TODAY (ISSN 1052-5173 USPS 0456-530) prints news Cover: Mount Holyoke College astronomy students field-testing a and information for more than 26,000 GSA member readers and subscribing libraries, with 11 monthly issues (March/ Raman BRAVO spectrometer for field mineral identification, examin- April is a combined issue). GSA TODAY is published by The ing pegmatite minerals crosscutting a slightly foliated hornblende Geological Society of America® Inc. (GSA) with offices at quartz monzodiorite and narrow aplite dikes exposed in the spillway 3300 Penrose Place, Boulder, Colorado, USA, and a mail- of the Quabbin Reservoir. 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Photo courtesy of USGS. Extracting Bulk Rock Properties from Microscale Measurements: Subsampling and Analytical Guidelines M.C. McCanta, Dept. of Earth and Planetary Sciences, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Tennessee 37996, USA; M.D. Dyar, Dept. of Astronomy, Mount Holyoke College, South Hadley, Massachusetts 01075, USA; and P.A. Dobosh, Dept. of Computer Science, Mount Holyoke College, South Hadley, Massachusetts 01075, USA ABSTRACT terminology based on bulk rock character- formation conditions, as well as pseudo- Geologists are commonly faced with istics persists even in the twenty-first section analysis (e.g., Nutman et al., 1997; questions relating to representative sam- century. Thus an ironic modern conundrum Powell et al., 1998; Bucher and Frey, 2002). pling at all scales: outcrop to formation, is this: how many microanalyses of a Despite the importance of bulk rock hand sample to bulk rock, microanalysis rock are needed to accurately represent data, they are surprisingly complicated to to overall chemistry. A new computer its bulk composition? measure. For glassy or fine-grained rocks model allows quantitative answers to the The problematic issue is that of scale, (e.g., pumice or shale), direct microanaly- question of how many different micro- i.e., the ratio of sampling size to that of the ses and bulk techniques easily yield com- analysis spots are needed to determine feature being measured. Field geologists parable results. Complications arise when different bulk properties of a rock for any encounter this problem when they set out a rock contains xenocrysts or rock frag- type and scale of measurement, including to sample an outcrop: how many hand ments that are not in equilibrium, or when whole rock composition and oxidation samples will represent the bulk character- mineral chemical zonation is present. It state. The relationships among grain size, istics of the outcrop, or even the entire should be obvious why bulk composition glass ordering, and microbeam size, the formation? For geochemists, the scale of calculations are rarely attempted on composition and heterogeneity of the rocks interest is that of mineral grain size rela- coarse-grained samples. For porphyritic or studied, and the location of the analyses tive to analytical beam size. As microbeam most metamorphosed rocks, determining a relative to textural features are all impor- techniques continue to sample smaller vol- bulk composition is possible but tedious. tant. These variables can be grouped into umes, the scale may be that of individual Igneous rocks can be crushed and hand- those that affect the heterogeneity (H) of atoms. Increasing resolution only exacer- picked to separate the glass for melt com- the material versus the scale of measure- bates the understanding of bulk geological position analysis, or mass balance calcula- ments (M) being used. For rocks where H properties. tions can be run using glass and crystalline (grain size, glass long- or short-range Why are bulk rock analyses important? compositions from electron probe micro- ordering, or composition) <<M (beam Because magma composition is rarely, if analysis (EPMA). Alternatively, material size), an average of fewer than ten analy- ever, measured in its liquid state, data from can be ground and fused experimentally ses will yield a representative bulk rock the resulting solidified materials must be prior to bulk or microanalysis. These are composition no matter how heterogeneous used to back-calculate original compositions time-consuming tasks, and the accuracy of the phase assemblage. For rocks where and conditions. In an era when microanal- these estimation methods is difficult to H M, hundreds of analyses may be ysis is routine, bulk rock composition is quantify. In addition, the total sample vol- needed to result in acceptable analytical still an important parameter because it ume may be prohibitively small to apply precision. Guidelines for how many sam- permits correlations with other rocks and these methods to, as is often the case for ples/analyses are needed to represent geo- geologically related regions (e.g., Philpotts extraterrestrial materials, thereby requir- logic materials at any scale are presented. and Ague, 2009). On an even broader ing a microanalytical technique. scale, knowledge of magma source region Moreover, “bulk analysis” means differ- INTRODUCTION conditions and compositions helps define ent things for varying scales of geologic For more than a century, geologists have the state of the mantle, provides insight processes and analytical instruments; a used bulk analyses (e.g., Bowen, 1928; into the geochemistry of crystallization “bulk” analysis for one application