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Mid-ocean ridge unfaulting revealed by magmatic intrusions
Recent sequences of reverse-faulting earthquakes at the Mid-Atlantic Ridge and the Carlsberg Ridge show that tectonic extension at mid-ocean ridge axes can be partially undone by tectonic shortening across the ridge flanks.
- Jean-Arthur Olive
- , Göran Ekström
- & Manon Bickert
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Article
| Open AccessSublithospheric diamond ages and the supercontinent cycle
The ages and geochemical compositions of inclusions of sublithospheric diamonds indicate additions to the mantle keel of Gondwana by the underplating of buoyant subducted material, originating from 300–700-km depth, which may have contributed to supercontinent stability during long-distance migration.
- Suzette Timmerman
- , Thomas Stachel
- & D. Graham Pearson
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Article
| Open AccessRift-induced disruption of cratonic keels drives kimberlite volcanism
Most kimberlites erupting in the past billion years on Earth did so about 30 million years after continental breakup, with dynamical and analytical models suggesting a control from rifting-related mantle delamination.
- Thomas M. Gernon
- , Stephen M. Jones
- & Anne Glerum
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Article
| Open AccessHadaean to Palaeoarchaean stagnant-lid tectonics revealed by zircon magnetism
Magnetic palaeointensity data from the Barberton Greenstone Belt (South Africa) as well as the Jack Hills (Western Australia) show nearly constant palaeofield values between 3.9 Ga and 3.4 Ga, providing evidence for stagnant-lid mantle convection.
- John A. Tarduno
- , Rory D. Cottrell
- & Gautam Mitra
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Article |
Topography of mountain belts controlled by rheology and surface processes
Using the new Beaumont number presented, it is concluded that the topographic evolution of collisional mountain belts is determined by the combination of plate velocity, crustal rheology and surface process efficiency.
- Sebastian G. Wolf
- , Ritske S. Huismans
- & Xiaoping Yuan
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Review Article |
Evolution of Earth’s tectonic carbon conveyor belt
Oceanic plate carbon reservoirs are reconstructed and the fate of subducted carbon is tracked using thermodynamic modelling, challenging previous views and providing boundary conditions for future carbon cycle models.
- R. Dietmar Müller
- , Ben Mather
- & Sabin Zahirovic
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Article |
A plume origin for hydrous melt at the lithosphere–asthenosphere boundary
By combining experimental constraints on mantle melting with magnetotelluric data, volatile-rich melts emplaced by a mantle plume were shown to be present in the asthenosphere beneath the Cocos Plate.
- Daniel Blatter
- , Samer Naif
- & Anandaroop Ray
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Article |
Assembly of the basal mantle structure beneath Africa
Reconstruction of one billion years of mantle flow shows that mobile basal mantle structures are just as consistent with the Earth’s volcanic history as are fixed mantle structures.
- Nicolas Flament
- , Ömer F. Bodur
- & Andrew S. Merdith
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Article |
Dynamic slab segmentation due to brittle–ductile damage in the outer rise
Numerical subduction models used to determine the consequences of bending-induced plate damage show that slab weakening and segmentation can occur at the outer-rise region of the subducting plate.
- T. V. Gerya
- , D. Bercovici
- & T. W. Becker
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Article |
Three-dimensional magnetic stripes require slow cooling in fast-spread lower ocean crust
A record of Earth’s magnetic field constructed from near-bottom magnetization observations and oriented samples provides three-dimensional imaging of magnetic stripes in fast-spread crust, and suggests slow cooling off-axis, as opposed to deep hydrothermal cooling close to the spreading ridge.
- Sarah M. Maher
- , Jeffrey S. Gee
- & Barbara E. John
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Article |
Fluid-rich subducting topography generates anomalous forearc porosity
Electromagnetic data collected at the northern Hikurangi Margin, New Zealand show that a seamount on the incoming plate allows more water to subduct, compared with normal, unfaulted oceanic lithosphere.
- Christine Chesley
- , Samer Naif
- & Dan Bassett
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Article |
Extensional tectonics and two-stage crustal accretion at oceanic transform faults
Oceanic transform faults are systemically deeper than their associated fracture zones, owing to the plate boundary experiencing increasingly oblique shear at increasing depths below the seafloor.
- Ingo Grevemeyer
- , Lars H. Rüpke
- & Colin W. Devey
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Article |
Propagation of large earthquakes as self-healing pulses or mild cracks
Numerical simulations indicate that seismological observations of large megathrust earthquakes are better matched by crack-like ruptures on persistently weak faults than by self-healing pulse-like ruptures on stronger faults.
- Valère Lambert
- , Nadia Lapusta
- & Stephen Perry
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Article |
Thermochemical lithosphere differentiation and the origin of cratonic mantle
A model is proposed for the origin of cratonic lithospheric mantle in which rifting and melting in the hot, early Earth mantle leave behind large volumes of stiffer, depleted mantle.
- Fabio A. Capitanio
- , Oliver Nebel
- & Peter A. Cawood
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Article |
Building cratonic keels in Precambrian plate tectonics
Modelling reveals how thick diamondiferous continental mantle ‘keels’ were formed only at increased mantle temperatures when the melt-depleted, hot, ductile mantle located under subducting oceanic plates flowed backwards, underplating the continents.
- A. L. Perchuk
- , T. V. Gerya
- & W. L. Griffin
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Article |
Megathrust shear force controls mountain height at convergent plate margins
Simulations using a force balance model match mountain heights observed around the globe, suggesting that mountain elevation is almost completely controlled by tectonic forces rather than erosion.
- Armin Dielforder
- , Ralf Hetzel
- & Onno Oncken
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Article |
Displaced cratonic mantle concentrates deep carbon during continental rifting
Carbon dioxide and helium data support lateral advection of carbon-rich cratonic mantle below the East African Rift System, which concentrates deep carbon and causes active carbonatite magmatism near the craton edge.
- James D. Muirhead
- , Tobias P. Fischer
- & Cynthia J. Ebinger
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Article |
Months-long thousand-kilometre-scale wobbling before great subduction earthquakes
Observed reversals in GNSS surface motions suggests greatly enhanced slab pull in the months preceding the great subduction earthquakes in Maule (Chile, 2010) and Tohoku-oki (Japan, 2011) of moment magnitudes 8.8 and 9.0.
- Jonathan R. Bedford
- , Marcos Moreno
- & Michael Bevis
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Letter |
Metamorphism and the evolution of plate tectonics
Variability in Earth’s thermal gradients, recorded by metamorphic rocks through time, shows that Earth’s modern plate tectonics developed gradually since the Neoarchaean era, three billion years ago.
- Robert M. Holder
- , Daniel R. Viete
- & Tim E. Johnson
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Article |
Surface erosion events controlled the evolution of plate tectonics on Earth
The rise of continents and the accumulation of sediments in trenches since about three billion years ago has had a crucial role in the emergence and evolution of plate tectonics on Earth.
- Stephan V. Sobolev
- & Michael Brown
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Article |
Southward propagation of Nazca subduction along the Andes
The current phase of subduction of the Nazca slab was established in the Peruvian Andes after a plate reorganization around 80 million years ago and then propagated progressively southwards.
- Yi-Wei Chen
- , Jonny Wu
- & John Suppe
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Letter |
Deep learning of aftershock patterns following large earthquakes
Neural networks trained on data from about 130,000 aftershocks from around 100 large earthquakes improve predictions of the spatial distribution of aftershocks and suggest physical quantities that may control earthquake triggering.
- Phoebe M. R. DeVries
- , Fernanda Viégas
- & Brendan J. Meade
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Letter |
Earthquake-induced transformation of the lower crust
During continent collision and associated mountain building, a surprisingly large volume of the lower crust is shown to be affected by earthquake aftershocks, producing a top-down effect on crustal geodynamics.
- Bjørn Jamtveit
- , Yehuda Ben-Zion
- & Håkon Austrheim
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Letter |
Episodic kinematics in continental rifts modulated by changes in mantle melt fraction
GPS measurements are used to investigate the continental rift system of North Island, New Zealand, and to develop a model for short-term deformation involving flexing of an elastic upper crust caused by episodic changes in mantle viscosity and melt fraction.
- Simon Lamb
- , James D. P. Moore
- & Tim Stern
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Letter |
Extreme hydrothermal conditions at an active plate-bounding fault
Extreme temperatures and fluid pressures are measured, and their causes modelled, in a borehole into the Alpine Fault, where an earthquake rupture is expected within the next few decades.
- Rupert Sutherland
- , John Townend
- & Martin Zimmer
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Letter |
The concurrent emergence and causes of double volcanic hotspot tracks on the Pacific plate
The emergence of geographically and geochemically distinct double volcanic chains on the Pacific plate coincides with a recent azimuthal change in the motion of the plate.
- T. D. Jones
- , D. R. Davies
- & C. R. Wilson
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Letter |
Experimental evidence that thrust earthquake ruptures might open faults
Earthquake rupture experiments and mathematical modelling reveal the existence of a torquing mechanism of thrust fault ruptures near the free surface that causes them to dynamically unclamp, open and slip large distances.
- Vahe Gabuchian
- , Ares J. Rosakis
- & Hiroo Kanamori
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Letter |
Rheological separation of the megathrust seismogenic zone and episodic tremor and slip
A model of the conditions required for episodic tremor and accompanying slow slip to occur, near the megathrust seismogenic zone, reconciles seemingly contradictory observations.
- Xiang Gao
- & Kelin Wang
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Letter |
Earth’s first stable continents did not form by subduction
Phase equilibria modelling of rocks from Western Australia confirms that the ancient continental crust could have formed by multistage melting of basaltic ‘parents’ along high geothermal gradients—a process incompatible with modern-style subduction.
- Tim E. Johnson
- , Michael Brown
- & R. Hugh Smithies
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Letter |
Reorientation and faulting of Pluto due to volatile loading within Sputnik Planitia
The location of Sputnik Planitia on Pluto is shown to result from volatiles sequestered within the basin forcing the reorientation of the dwarf planet, as supported by the planet-wide fault network.
- James T. Keane
- , Isamu Matsuyama
- & Jordan K. Steckloff
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Letter |
Dynamics of a seafloor-spreading episode at the East Pacific Rise
Seismic observations clarify the roles of magma pressure and tectonic stress in the development of seafloor spreading during the most recent eruption at the East Pacific Rise.
- Yen Joe Tan
- , Maya Tolstoy
- & William S. D. Wilcock
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Letter |
Asthenosphere rheology inferred from observations of the 2012 Indian Ocean earthquake
Analysis of the postseismic deformation of the moment magnitude 8.6 Indian Ocean earthquake in 2012 reveals that the asthenospheric layer must be thin and of low viscosity, constraining the structure of oceanic upper-mantle rheology.
- Yan Hu
- , Roland Bürgmann
- & Kelin Wang
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Letter |
Abrupt plate accelerations shape rifted continental margins
By applying a new geotectonic analysis technique to revised global plate reconstructions, rifted margins are shown to feature an initial slow rift phase followed by an abrupt increase of plate divergence prior to breakup.
- Sascha Brune
- , Simon E. Williams
- & R. Dietmar Müller
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Letter |
High-resolution seismic constraints on flow dynamics in the oceanic asthenosphere
Rayleigh waves recorded with an ocean-bottom seismograph array in the central Pacific Ocean constrain the seismic anisotropy within the oceanic lithosphere–asthenosphere system: seafloor-spreading-induced lithospheric fabric generates the strongest anisotropy, while density- and/or pressure-driven flow produces a secondary peak in anisotropy at the base of the asthenosphere.
- Pei-Ying Patty Lin
- , James B. Gaherty
- & Greg Hirth
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Letter |
Mid-ocean-ridge seismicity reveals extreme types of ocean lithosphere
The structure and accretion modes of two end-member types of oceanic lithosphere are described using a detailed seismicity survey along 390 kilometres of an ultraslow ridge axis, indicating deeper seismicity in amagmatic regions and explaining the uneven crustal production at ultraslow-spreading ridges.
- Vera Schlindwein
- & Florian Schmid
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Letter |
Subduction controls the distribution and fragmentation of Earth’s tectonic plates
Computer models of mantle convection with plate-like behaviour are used to demonstrate that the size–frequency distribution of tectonic plates on Earth is controlled by subduction geometry—the spacing between subducting slabs controls the layout of large plates, and the stresses caused by the bending of trenches break plates into smaller fragments.
- Claire Mallard
- , Nicolas Coltice
- & Paul J. Tackley
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Letter |
Seafloor geodetic constraints on interplate coupling of the Nankai Trough megathrust zone
Seafloor geodetic data from the Nankai Trough, off southwestern Japan, show that most offshore sites in this earthquake-prone region have high slip-deficit rates, revealing previously unknown locations that could be important for the mitigation of future earthquake- and tsunami-associated disasters.
- Yusuke Yokota
- , Tadashi Ishikawa
- & Akira Asada
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Letter |
A rapid burst in hotspot motion through the interaction of tectonics and deep mantle flow
Models of thermochemical convection reveal flow patterns in the deep lower mantle under the north Pacific since 100 million years ago that explain how the enigmatic bend in the Hawaiian–Emperor hotspot track arose.
- Rakib Hassan
- , R. Dietmar Müller
- & Nicolas Flament
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Letter |
The Parkfield tremors reveal slow and fast ruptures on the same asperity
A tremor source on the San Andreas Fault produced an unusual sequence of low-frequency earthquakes until it was disrupted by the 2004 Parkfield earthquake; the peculiar recurrence pattern has now been modelled, showing that such slip behaviour occurs when the tremor asperity size is close to the critical nucleation size of earthquakes.
- Deepa Mele Veedu
- & Sylvain Barbot
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Letter |
Scale dependence of rock friction at high work rate
In metre-sized rock specimens, rock friction starts to decrease at a much smaller work rate than in centimetre-sized rock specimens, thus demonstrating that rock friction is scale-dependent.
- Futoshi Yamashita
- , Eiichi Fukuyama
- & Hironori Kawakata
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Letter |
Plate tectonics on the Earth triggered by plume-induced subduction initiation
High-resolution three-dimensional thermomechanical simulations of Earth's lithosphere indicate that mantle plumes could have initiated the first subduction zones, but only in the hotter early Earth for old oceanic plates.
- T. V. Gerya
- , R. J. Stern
- & S. A. Whattam
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Letter |
The role of ridges in the formation and longevity of flat slabs
Flat-slab subduction is often proposed to cause deformation of continental crust far from plate boundaries as well as unusual patterns of volcanism; a study of the largest-known flat slab, located in Peru, now shows that the ridge is necessary for the formation and longevity of the flat slab, whereas other contributing factors such as trench retreat and suction alone will not suffice.
- Sanja Knezevic Antonijevic
- , Lara S. Wagner
- & Cristobal Condori
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Letter |
Onset of Antarctic Circumpolar Current 30 million years ago as Tasmanian Gateway aligned with westerlies
Neodymium isotopes from fossil fish teeth and tectonic reconstructions show that the deep Tasmanian Gateway opened up about 33 million years ago and that the Antarctic Circumpolar Current arose 30 million years ago, when the gateway probably moved into the latitudes of the strong westerly winds.
- Howie D. Scher
- , Joanne M. Whittaker
- & Margaret L. Delaney
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Letter |
Experimental constraints on the electrical anisotropy of the lithosphere–asthenosphere system
Electrical anisotropy measurements at high temperatures and quasi-hydrostatic pressures on previously deformed olivine plus melt samples show that electrical conductivity is much higher in the direction of deformation; this is confirmed with a layered electrical model of the asthenosphere and lithosphere that reproduces existing field data.
- Anne Pommier
- , Kurt Leinenweber
- & James A. Tyburczy
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Letter |
Curtain eruptions from Enceladus’ south-polar terrain
Observations of the south pole of the Saturnian moon Enceladus revealed large rifts in the terrain that were found to be the sources of the observed jets of water vapour; now it is shown that much of the eruptive activity can be explained by broad, curtain-like eruptions, many of which were probably misinterpreted previously as discrete jets.
- Joseph N. Spitale
- , Terry A. Hurford
- & Symeon S. Platts
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Letter |
Seismic evidence of effects of water on melt transport in the Lau back-arc mantle
Tomographically derived seismic velocities are used to infer the distribution of partial melt below the Lau Basin, revealing an unexpected relationship between the amount of in situ melt and the water content of the magma, indicating that subducted water enhances melt extraction.
- S. Shawn Wei
- , Douglas A. Wiens
- & James A. Conder
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Letter |
Subduction-driven recycling of continental margin lithosphere
Seismic images of the subducted Atlantic slab under northeastern South America and the Alboran slab beneath the Gibraltar arc region show that subducting oceanic plates viscously entrain and remove the bottom of the continental thermal boundary layer from adjacent continental margins, driving surface tectonics and pre-conditioning the margins for further deformation.
- A. Levander
- , M. J. Bezada
- & M. S. Miller
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Letter |
Spreading continents kick-started plate tectonics
The slow gravitational collapse of early continents could have kick-started transient episodes of plate tectonics until, as the Earth’s interior cooled and oceanic lithosphere became heavier, plate tectonics became self-sustaining.
- Patrice F. Rey
- , Nicolas Coltice
- & Nicolas Flament
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Letter |
Prevalence of viscoelastic relaxation after the 2011 Tohoku-oki earthquake
Seafloor Global Positioning System observations immediately after the great 2011 Tohoku-oki earthquake provide unambiguous evidence for the dominant role of viscoelastic relaxation in short-term postseismic deformation, rather than just afterslip on the fault as is commonly assumed.
- Tianhaozhe Sun
- , Kelin Wang
- & Yan Hu