P-wave velocity structure beneath Mt. Melbourne in northern Victoria Land, Antarctica: Evidence of partial melting and volcanic magma sources

Mt. Melbourne is a late Cenozoic intraplate volcano located ∼30 km northeast of Jang Bogo Station in Antarctica. The volcano is quiescent with fumarolic activity at the summit. To monitor volcanic activity and glacial movements near Jang Bogo Station, a seismic network was installed during the 2010–11 Antarctic summer field season. The network is maintained during the summer field season every year, and the number of stations has been increased. We used continuous seismic data recorded by the network and an Italian seismic station (TNV) at Mario Zucchelli Station to develop a 3-D P-wave velocity model for the Mt. Melbourne area based on the teleseismic P-wave tomographic method. The new 3-D model presented a relative velocity structure for the lower part of the crust and upper mantle between depths of 30 and 160 km and revealed the presence of two low-velocity anomalies beneath Mt. Melbourne and the Priestley Fault. The low-velocity anomaly beneath Mt. Melbourne may be caused by the edge flow of hot mantle material at the lithospheric step between the thick East Antarctic Craton and thin Ross Sea crust. The other low-velocity anomaly along the Priestley Fault may have been beneath Mt. Melbourne and moved to the southern tip of the Deep Freeze Range, where the crustal thickness is relatively thin. The anomaly was trapped on the fault line and laterally flowed along the fault line in the northwest direction. •We model the first 3-d velocity structure beneath Mt. Melbourne, Antarctica.•The low-velocity anomalies indicate a partially melted mantle material.•The edge flow may cause the low-velocity anomalies beneath Mt. Melbourne.