Mount Pleasant Caldera rock. The Intercaldera Sequence comprises formations that crop out from overlying flows in triangularly shaped area, and includes thick volcanic ash (tuff), thick breccia layers, and intermediate to felsic igneous rocks that tend to intrude the above layers and are typically located along caldera margin faults. The Exocaldera Sequence contains ash flow tuffs, mafic lavas, alluvial redbeds, and porphyritic felsic lavas that are distributed across five different layers. The late Caldera-Fill Sequence contains rocks that are similar to those of the outflows of the other, older layers, and comprises two formations and two relatively minor intrusive lava flows. The volcanic
Altiplano–Puna volcanic complex layer containing melts reaching down to the Moho that inhibits the ascent of mafic magmas because of its higher buoyancy. Instead, melts generated in this zone eventually reach the surface, generating felsic volcanism. Some mafic magmas escape sideward after stalling in the melt containing zone; these generate more mafic volcanic systems at the edge of the felsic volcanism, such as Cerro Bitiche. The magmas are mixtures of crust derived and mafic mantle-derived melts with a consistent petrological and chemical signature. The melt generation process may involve several different layers in the crust. Another model requires the intrusion of basaltic melts