alkaline rock

alkaline rock, any of various rocks in which the chemical content of the alkalies (potassium oxide and sodium oxide) is great enough for alkaline minerals to form. Such minerals may be unusually sodium rich, with a relatively high ratio of alkalies to silica (SiO₂), as in the feldspathoids. Other alkaline minerals have a high ratio of alkalies to alumina (Al₂O₃), as in aegirine pyroxene and the sodic amphibole riebeckite.

English-speaking petrologists have followed Alfred Harker, who divided igneous rocks of Cenozoic age (that is, those laid down between about 65.5 million years ago and the present day) into calc-alkaline and alkaline suites. Alkaline rocks include many with unusual names, but the more common alkali-basalt, syenite, and phonolite are included in the group. The most common and widely distributed rocks of the world—e.g., granite, granodiorite, andesite, and basalt—do not contain the alkaline minerals. Alkaline rocks are generally considered to be abnormal types, and there have been many intensive studies of their origin, yielding a number of theories, each of which may be valid for a specific case.