Megan Taylor

My research focuses on understanding variations in the formation and accumulation of crustal sulphides along volcanic arcs. Previous work has shown that the copper content of magmas erupted in volcanic arcs varies in response to crustal thickness. This DPhil project examines whether crustal sulphide composition and abundance vary consistently along-arc with crustal thickness, using a range of elemental and isotope analyses on crustal xenoliths to calculate a crustal sulphur budget for different locations along the active Lesser Antilles Arc. This work will contribute to a better constraint of the sulphur budget of intra-oceanic volcanic arcs, with an application to global models of the sulphur cycle, as well as gaining insight into how variations in subduction zone parameters, specifically crustal thickness, impacts magmatic processes and the behaviour of sulphur.