Related topics: earth

Slow start of plate tectonics despite a hot early Earth

Writing in PNAS, scientists from Cologne university present important new constraints showing that plate tectonics started relatively slow, although the early Earth's interior was much hotter than today.

Researchers discover 'missing' piece of Hawaii's formation

An oceanic plateau has been observed for the first time in the Earth's lower mantle, 800 kilometers deep underneath Eastern Siberia, pushing Hawaii's birthplace back to 100 million years, says a Michigan State University ...

Former piece of Pacific Ocean floor imaged deep beneath China

In a study that gives new meaning to the term "rock bottom," seismic researchers have discovered the underside of a rocky slab of Earth's surface layer, or lithosphere, that has been pulled more than 400 miles beneath northeastern ...

Deep magma facilitates the movement of tectonic plates

Scientists from the Laboratoire de géologie de Lyon: Terre, planètes et environnement (CNRS/ENS de Lyon/Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1) report that a small amount of molten rock located under tectonic plates encourages ...

Geologists 'resurrect' missing tectonic plate

The existence of a tectonic plate called Resurrection has long been a topic of debate among geologists, with some arguing it was never real. Others say it subducted—moved sideways and downward—into the earth's mantle ...

page 21 from 40