V. S. Gokul 1,2,3., K. M. Sreejith4., G. Srinivasa Rao 5., M.
Radhakrishna 1*., P. G. Betts 2
1 Department of Earth Sciences, Indian Institute of
Technology Bombay, Mumbai 400 076, India.2 School of Earth, Atmosphere and Environment, Monash
University, Clayton, Victoria 3800, Australia.3 IITB-Monash Research Academy, Indian Institute of
Technology Bombay, Mumbai 400 076, India.4 Geosciences Division, Space Applications Centre,
Ahmedabad 380 015, India.5 Department of Applied Geophysics, Indian Institute
of Technology (Indian School of Mines) Dhanbad, Dhanbad 826 004, India
(*Corresponding author:gokul.vs@monash.edu)
Abstract
The Indian Ocean has the largest geoid anomaly, known as the Indian
Ocean Geoid Low (IOGL). This long wavelength geoid depression has a
magnitude of negative 106 m, and is centered south of India. The nature
and depth of the sources causing this characteristic low are poorly
constrained and has been the subject of debate. In this abstract, we
focus on understanding the density contributions to the geoid low from
the crust and upper mantle using joint analysis of geoid and gravity
data along with published tomographic models in the region.
Decomposition of geoid anomalies in the spectral domain indicate that
mass anomalies below the upper mantle (> 700 km) contribute
to 90% of the total geoid anomaly. In order to compute the upper mantle
contribution to the IOGL, we used the Moho geometry and the crustal
density structure from the 3-D gravity inversion, and the SL2013sv
tomography model for the upper mantle density structure. The presence of
density sources, which was not resolved in the modeling within the
sub-lithospheric mantle is confirmed upon comparing the crustal and
upper mantle (up to 700 km) geoid response below the IOGL with n=10
residual geoid anomaly. Integrated gravity-geoid 2-D modeling of the
geometries of the anomalous sources located at the base of LAB and at a
depth of 320-340 km, respectively, confirms that the contribution of
density structures up to 700 km explains only the ten percent of the
IOGL which matches well with the spectral decomposition results. This
suggests that the lower mantle sources, such as paleo-subducted slabs or
plume sources from the core-mantle boundary significantly contributes to
the IOGL.