VOLCANIC HOT SPOTS ARE NOT STATIONARY

Scientists have long considered volcanic hot spots, like those that created the Hawaiian Islands, stationary Points, but a new study finds they are actually in constant motion.

The findings ,  which appear in in Nature Communications , solve a major debate about the origin of the large-scale structure of the Earth’s surface and deep interior.

The Earth’s lithosphere is the outer most shell of our planet, composed of seven major puzzle pieces known as tectonic plates. While today each of the tectonic plates roughly encompasses one of the seven continents and the Pacific Ocean, scientists believe the pieces once fit together to form super continents.

Earth’s last supercontinent, Pangea, began to break apart about 175 million ago  . Much of the Earth’s seismic activity, including earthquakes and volcanoes, occurs at the boundaries of the tectonic plates.

But there are other regions on Earth characterized by   volcanic activity, independent of the plate boundaries.

Researchers   refer to these areas as hot spots. Scientists believe hot spots develop above abnormally hot upwelling’s of magma in the Earth‘s mantle called mantle plumes.

Courtesy – Free press Journal