Featured Researcher
UC Davis: C.S Natraj
We have been using the SDSC supercomputing facilities to perform numerical simulations of a mantle plume beneath the Tharsis region on Mars.
The simulations are being performed in 3-D spherical geometry using a modified version of CitcomS [1], a finite element code designed for studies of mantle convection. The one plume model for uplift of Tharsis is being reconciled with crustal production rates. Due to the enormous computing needs associated with 3-D geometry and strongly time dependent nature of mantle convection at high Rayleigh numbers, we had been bottlenecked with resolution. The use of the SDSC supercomputing facilities has helped us break the barrier. The newly built immersive visualization system at the U.C. Davis W. M. Keck Center for Active Visualization in Earth Sciences is being used to visualize the data generated at the SDSC.
We have tested some preliminary models of convection in the Martian mantle and figure 1 below shows the contour plot of temperature imbedded with a temperature isosurface of one such model. The domain (with a aspect ratio of 2*2*1 and 1.7 million nodes) represents the Tharsis region on Mars in area and location. The mushroom shaped plume similar to those seen in laboratory experiments is clearly visible. The model seems to point in the direction that a single plume could exist beneath Tharsis though the uplift may or may not be a product of it. The future scope of the project involves calculating the melt production and thereby the crustal production rate.
References
1) Zhong, S., Zuber, M. T., Moresi, L. N. & Gurnis, M. The role of temperature dependent viscosity and surface plates in spherical shell models of mantle convection. J. Geophys. Res. 105, 11,063-11,082 (2000).
