Student volcanologist studies Bogoslof volcano

University of Alaska Fairbanks scientists are presenting their work at the American Geophysical Union’s fall meeting in New Orleans this week. This article is part of a series highlighting UAF research from the world’s largest Earth and space science meeting.

Magma recharge from the late 2016 eruption of Bogoslof Volcano in Alaska resumed in March 2017 and continued until the end of a months-long eruptive period in August of that year, according to a new research method that adds to the evidence about the volcano’s awakening after 24 years of quiet.

University of Alaska Fairbanks graduate student Jamshid Moshrefzadeh, under guidance from UAF Geophysical Institute research associate professor Pavel Izbekov, analyzed zones within crystals to determine the timescale of Bogoslof’s magmatic activity.

If you cut a tree and look at the rings, you can tell when there was a forest fire or when certain things were happening,” Moshrefzadeh said. “It’s similar to how crystals are recording what's happening in the magma chamber.”

The method, called diffusion chronometry, could help predict eruptions at other volcanoes.

“If we understand the timescales at which these magmatic processes occur, then we can correlate this with interdisciplinary data such as gas fluxes and seismicity from real-time monitoring of volcanoes,” Moshrefzadeh said. “In the future, if you see certain signals in seismicity or gas flux, you can use the understanding from our diffusion study to give a window of time — days, weeks or months — before you might expect this type of eruption.”

Bogoslof rises about 6,000 feet from the Bering Sea floor but only about 300 feet above sea level. It is 60 miles west of the Aleutian Islands city of Dutch Harbor.

Moshrefzadeh’s abstract is available here.