Seafloor spreading

Seafloor spreading is a geologic process in which tectonic plates—large slabs of

Earth's lithosphere—split apart from each other.
 
Seafloor spreading and other tectonic activity processes are the result of mantle
convection. Mantle convection is the slow, churning motion of
Earth’s mantle. Convection currents carry heat from the lower mantle and core to the
lithosphere. Convection currents also “recycle” lithospheric materials back to the mantle.
 
Seafloor spreading occurs at divergent plate boundaries. As tectonic plates slowly move
away from each other, heat from the mantle’s convection currents makes
the crust more plastic and less dense. The less-dense material rises, often forming a
mountain or elevated area of the seafloor.
 
Eventually, the crust cracks. Hot magma fueled by mantle convection bubbles up to fill
these fractures and spills onto the crust. This bubbled-up magma is cooled
by frigid seawater to form igneous rock. This rock (basalt) becomes a new part of
Earth’s crust.
 
Mid-Ocean Ridges
 
Seafloor spreading occurs along mid-ocean ridges—large mountain ranges rising from
the ocean floor. The Mid-Atlantic Ridge, for instance, separates the North American
plate from the Eurasian plate, and the South American plate from the African plate. The
East Pacific Rise is a mid-ocean ridge that runs through the eastern Pacific Ocean and
separates the Pacific plate from the North American plate, the Cocos plate, the Nazca
plate, and the Antarctic plate. The Southeast Indian Ridge marks where the southern
Indo-Australian plate forms a divergent boundary with the Antarctic plate.
 
Seafloor spreading is not consistent at all mid-ocean ridges. Slowly spreading ridges
are the sites of tall, narrow underwater cliffs and mountains. Rapidly spreading ridges
have a much more gentle slopes.
 
The Mid-Atlantic Ridge, for instance, is a slow spreading center. It spreads 2-5
centimeters (.8-2 inches) every year and forms an ocean trench about the size of the
Grand Canyon. The East Pacific Rise, on the other hand, is a fast spreading center. It
spreads about 6-16 centimeters (3-6 inches) every year. There is not an ocean trench at
the East Pacific Rise, because the seafloor spreading is too rapid for one to develop!
 
The newest, thinnest crust on Earth is located near the center of mid-ocean ridge—the
actual site of seafloor spreading. The age, density, and thickness of oceanic crust
increases with distance from the mid-ocean ridge.
 
Geomagnetic Reversals
The magnetism of mid-ocean ridges helped scientists first identify the process of
seafloor spreading in the early 20th century. Basalt, the once-molten rock that makes up
most new oceanic crust, is a fairly magnetic substance, and scientists began
using magnetometers to measure the magnetism of the ocean floor in the 1950s. What
they discovered was that the magnetism of the ocean floor around mid-ocean ridges
was divided into matching “stripes” on either side of the ridge. The specific magnetism
of basalt rock is determined by the Earth’s magnetic field when the magma is cooling.
 
Scientists determined that the same process formed the perfectly symmetrical stripes
on both side of a mid-ocean ridge. The continual process of seafloor spreading
separated the stripes in an orderly pattern.
 
Geographic Features
Oceanic crust slowly moves away from mid-ocean ridges and sites of seafloor
spreading. As it moves, it becomes cooler, more dense, and more thick. Eventually,
older oceanic crust encounters a tectonic boundary with continental crust.
 
In some cases, oceanic crust encounters an active plate margin. An active plate margin
is an actual plate boundary, where oceanic crust and continental crust crash into each
other. Active plate margins are often the site of earthquakes and volcanoes. Oceanic
crust created by seafloor spreading in the East Pacific Rise, for instance, may become
part of the Ring of Fire, the horseshoe-shaped pattern of volcanoes and earthquake
zones around the Pacific ocean basin.
 
In other cases, oceanic crust encounters a passive plate margin. Passive margins are
not plate boundaries, but areas where a single tectonic plate transitions from oceanic
lithosphere to continental lithosphere. Passive margins are not sites of faults
or subduction zones. Thick layers of sediment overlay the transitional crust of a passive
margin. The oceanic crust of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, for instance, will either become part
of the passive margin on the North American plate (on the east coast of North America)
or the Eurasian plate (on the west coast of Europe).
 
New geographic features can be created through seafloor spreading. The Red Sea, for
example, was created as the African plate and the Arabian plate tore away from each
other. Today, only the Sinai Peninsula connects the Middle East (Asia) with North
Africa. Eventually, geologists predict, seafloor spreading will completely separate the
two continents—and join the Red and Mediterranean Seas.
 
Mid-ocean ridges and seafloor spreading can also influence sea levels. As oceanic
crust moves away from the shallow mid-ocean ridges, it cools and sinks as it becomes
more dense. This increases the volume of the ocean basin and decreases the sea level.
For instance, a mid-ocean ridge system in Panthalassa—an ancient ocean that
surrounded the supercontinent Pangaea—contributed to shallower oceans and higher
sea levels in the Paleozoic era. Panthalassa was an early form of the Pacific Ocean,
which today experiences less seafloor spreading and has a much less extensive mid-
ocean ridge system. This helps explain why sea levels have fallen dramatically over the
past 80 million years.
 
Seafloor spreading disproves an early part of the theory of continental drift. Supporters
of continental drift originally theorized that the continents moved (drifted) through
unmoving oceans. Seafloor spreading proves that the ocean itself is a site of tectonic
activity.
 
Keeping Earth in Shape
 
Seafloor spreading is just one part of plate tectonics. Subduction is another. Subduction
happens where tectonic plates crash into each other instead of spreading apart. At
subduction zones, the edge of the denser plate subducts, or slides, beneath the less-
dense one. The denser lithospheric material then melts back into the Earth's mantle.
 
Seafloor spreading creates new crust. Subduction destroys old crust. The two forces
roughly balance each other, so the shape and diameter of the Earth remain constant.

Convection

Convection
Convection is the process of carrying heat stored in a particle of the
fluid into another location. Heat loss may occur by convection to
cooler surrounding air or heat gain from surrounding warmer air. Air
passing over the skin surface not only evaporates moisture, but also
transfers sensible heat to or from the body. The faster the rate of air
movement, the larger is the temperature difference between the body
and surrounding air; and the larger the body surface area, the greater
is the rate of heat transfer. When the air temperature is lower than that
of the skin (and clothing), the convective heat term (C v) in equation
[1.2] is positive and the body loses heat to the air. If the air is warmer
than the skin temperature, the convective heat term (Cv) is negative
and the body gains heat from the air. Convection becomes
increasingly effective at dissipating heat as air temperature decreases
and air movement increases.

Convection is the bulk movement of the liquid under the driving force
of density differences in the liquid. In Section 5.3.4 we shall consider
the problems raised by convection driven by solutes; heavy solutes
cause the liquid to sink, and the lighter solutes cause flotation. In this
section, we shall confine our discussion simply to the effects of
temperature: hot liquid will expand, becoming less dense, and will rise;
cool liquid will contract, becoming denser, and so will sink.
The existence of convection has been cited as important because it
affects the columnar to equiaxed transition (Smith et al., 1990). There
may be some truth in this. However, in most castings, grain structure
is of no importance. Hardly any customer specifies the grain structure
of their castings, the usual only critical features being soundness and
leak tightness. Only in very few castings is grain size specified or is in
any way noticeably significant in terms of affecting properties. Turbine
blades are the exceptional example.
It is of course understood that soundness is of vital importance to
nearly every casting, but it is not well known that in certain
circumstances, convection can give severe unsoundness problems.
This is especially true in counter-gravity systems, and sometimes in
investment castings. This important phenomenon is dealt with at
length in Chapter 10, Rule 7 for the manufacture of good castings. It is
recommended reading.

Plate boundaries

In some ways, Earth resembles a giant jigsaw puzzle. That is because its outer surface is
composed of about 20 tectonic plates, enormous sections of Earth’s crust that roughly fit
together and meet at places called plate boundaries.

Plate boundaries are important because they are often associated with earthquakes and
volcanoes. When Earth’s tectonic plates grind past one another, enormous amounts of energy
can be released in the form of earthquakes. Volcanoes are also often found near plate
boundaries because molten rock from deep within Earth—called magma—can travel upward at
these intersections between plates.

There are many different types of plate boundaries. For example, sections of Earth’s crust can
come together and collide (a “convergent” plate boundary), spread apart (a “divergent” plate
boundary), or slide past one another (a “transform” plate boundary). Each of these types of plate
boundaries is associated with different geological features.

Typically, a convergent plate boundary—such as the one between the Indian Plate and the
Eurasian Plate—forms towering mountain ranges, like the Himalaya, as Earth’s crust is
crumpled and pushed upward. In some cases, however, a convergent plate boundary can result
in one tectonic plate diving underneath another. This process, called “subduction,” involves an
older, denser tectonic plate being forced deep into the planet underneath a younger, less-dense
tectonic plate. When this process occurs in the ocean, an trench">ocean trench can form. These
trenches are some of the deepest places in the ocean, and they are often the sites of strong
earthquakes.

When subduction occurs, a chain of volcanoes often develops near the convergent plate
boundary. One such chain of volcanoes can be found on the western coast of the United States,
spanning across the states of California, Oregon, and Washington.

A divergent plate boundary often forms a mountain chain known as a ridge. This feature forms
as magma escapes into the space between the spreading tectonic plates. One example of a
ridge is the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, an undersea chain of mountains that formed as two pairs of
tectonic plates spread apart: the North American Plate and the Eurasian Plate in the north, and
the South American Plate and the African Plate in the south. Because ocean ridges are found
underwater, often at great depths, they can be hard to study. In fact, scientists know more about
the surfaces of some of the other planets in our solar system than they do about ocean ridges.

A transform plate boundary occurs when two plates slide past each other, horizontally. A well-
known transform plate boundary is the San Andreas Fault, which is responsible for many of
California’s earthquakes.

A single tectonic plate can have multiple types of plate boundaries with the other plates that
surround it. For instance, the Pacific Plate, one of Earth’s largest tectonic plates, includes
convergent, divergent, and transform plate boundaries.

Ocean basin evolution

his chapter describes the development and evolution of the ocean basins. Oceanic crust is much
younger than most continental crust. Ocean basins form initially by the stretching and splitting
(rifting) of continental crust and by the rise of mantle material and magma into the crack to
form new oceanic lithosphere. Among the major ocean basins, the Atlantic has the simplest
pattern of ocean-floor ages. Subduction is confined to relatively small island arc systems in the
Caribbean and the extreme southwest. Thus, it is easy to reconstruct its successive stages. In
contrast, both the Pacific and Indian oceans are characterized by changes of spreading rate and
direction and the development of new spreading axes. Because of these complications, it is
difficult to work out the changes in the shapes of these ocean basins. The Mediterranean can be
classified as an ocean in the final stages of its life cycle—the only major remnant of the once
extensive Tethys Ocean. The Mediterranean is shrinking as the African Plate continues to thrust
its way northwards beneath the European Plate. It is expected that the Mediterranean would be
floored by oceanic crust dating back perhaps as far as Jurassic times, which would be consistent
with its being the remnant of an old ocean and that it would have an obvious major trench.
This chapter discusses the topographic features of ocean basins. The two most striking features
of the ocean floor are the world-wide ridge-rift systems traversing all the major ocean basins and
the peripheral systems of deep trenches. Ocean ridges (spreading axes) are the most important
physiographic (bathymetric) features of the ocean basins. They are the constructive margins of
the plates, where new oceanic lithosphere is continually being generated. Spreading axes are
offset by transform faults that lie along arcs of small circles about the pole of relative rotation of
lithospheric plates. Transform faults are seismically active, and they separate plates moving in
opposite directions. Abyssal plains occupy large areas of the deep ocean floor. They are very flat
as a result of the burial of the rough topography of the oceanic crust by sediments. Linear chains
of seamounts and islands and aseismic ridges are thought to result from hot-spot volcanism,
whereby the oceanic plate moves over an intermittently or continually active fixed source of
magma rising from the deep mantle. Satellite altimetry measurements can also be used to map
features on the seafloor, because the mean sea-surface height correlates with ocean bathymetry.

n this second edition the technological advances in fields as diverse as:

- deep-towed instruments for `sniffing' hydrothermal plumes
- mapping the sea-floor by sophisticated sonar techniques
- three-dimensional imaging of crustal structure by seismic tomography
- the use of satellites for navigation, and for making precise measurements of the height of the
sea-surface

The first chapters describe the processes that shape the ocean basins, determine the structure
and composition of oceanic crust and control the major features of continental margins. How the
'hot springs' of the oceanic ridges cycle chemical elements between seawater and oceanic crust
is then explored. Sediment distributions are examined next, to demonstrate how sediments can
preserve a record of past climatic and sea-level changes. Finally, the role of the oceans as an
integral part of global chemical changes is reviewed.