Intrusive rock Intrusive rock Intrusive rock (also called plutonic rock) is formed when magma crystallizes and solidifies underground to form "intrusions", for example plutons, batholiths, dikes, sills, laccoliths, and volcanic necks. Intrusive rock forms within Earth's crust from the crystallization of magma. Many mountain ranges, such as the Sierra Nevada in California, are formed mostly from large granite (or related rock) intrusions; see Sierra Nevada batholith. Intrusions are one of the two ways igneous rock can form; the other is extrusive rock, that is, a volcanic eruption or similar event. Technically speaking, an intrusion is any formation of intrusive igneous rock; rock
Calc-alkaline magma series to increase as the melt is depleted of iron-poor crystals. (Magnesium-rich olivine solidifies at much higher temperatures than iron-rich olivine.) However, a calc-alkaline magma is oxidized enough to (simultaneously) precipitate significant amounts of the iron oxide magnetite, causing the iron content of the magma to remain more steady as it cools than with a tholeiitic magma. The difference between these two magma series can be seen on an AFM diagram, a ternary diagram showing the relative proportions of the oxides of NaO + KO (A), FeO + FeO (F), and MgO (M). As magmas cool, they precipitate out significantly more