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The internal structure of Earth. Earth's mantle is a layer of silicate rock between the crust and the outer core. It has a mass of 4.01 × 10 24 kg (8.84 × 10 24 lb) and makes up 67% of the mass of Earth. [1] It has a thickness of 2,900 kilometers (1,800 mi) [1] making up about 46% of Earth's
A mantle plume is a proposed mechanism of convection within the Earth's mantle, hypothesized to explain anomalous volcanism. [2] Because the plume head partially melts on reaching shallow depths, a plume is often invoked as the cause of volcanic hotspots, such as Hawaii or Iceland, and large igneous provinces such as the Deccan and Siberian Traps.
It was later postulated that hotspots are fed by streams of hot mantle rising from the Earth's core–mantle boundary in a structure called a mantle plume. [6] Whether or not such mantle plumes exist has been the subject of a major controversy in Earth science, [4] [7] but seismic images consistent with evolving theory now exist. [8]
The formation and development of plumes in the early mantle contributed to triggering the lateral movement of crust across the Earth's surface. [18] The effect of upwelling mantle plumes on the lithosphere can be seen today through local depressions around hotspots such as Hawaii. The scale of this impact is much less than that exhibited in the ...
Separating the planet’s rocky crust and the molten outer core, the mantle makes up 70 percent of the Earth’s mass and 84 percent of its volume. But despite its outsized influence on the planet ...
Mantle convection is the very slow creep of Earth's solid silicate mantle as convection currents carry heat from the interior to the planet's surface. [2] [3] Mantle convection causes tectonic plates to move around the Earth's surface. [4] The Earth's lithosphere rides atop the asthenosphere, and the two form the components of the upper mantle ...
Scientists using an ocean drilling vessel have dug the deepest hole ever in rock from Earth's mantle - penetrating 4,160 feet (1,268 meters) below the Atlantic seabed - and obtained a large sample ...
Mantle plumes were first proposed by J. Tuzo Wilson in 1963 [4] [non-primary source needed] and further developed by W. Jason Morgan in 1971. A mantle plume is posited to exist where hot rock nucleates [clarification needed] at the core-mantle boundary and rises through the Earth's mantle becoming a diapir in the Earth's crust. [5]