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Spreading rate is the rate at which an ocean basin widens due to seafloor spreading. (The rate at which new oceanic lithosphere is added to each tectonic plate on either side of a mid-ocean ridge is the spreading half-rate and is equal to half of the spreading rate). Spreading rates determine if the ridge is fast, intermediate, or slow.
Harry Hess proposed the seafloor spreading hypothesis in 1960 (published in 1962 [1]); the term "spreading of the seafloor" was introduced by geophysicist Robert S. Dietz in 1961. [2] According to Hess, seafloor was created at mid-oceanic ridges by the convection of the Earth's mantle, pushing and spreading the older crust away from the ridge. [3]
The depth of the seafloor on the flanks of a mid-ocean ridge is determined mainly by the age of the oceanic lithosphere; older seafloor is deeper. During seafloor spreading, lithosphere and mantle cooling, contraction, and isostatic adjustment with age cause seafloor deepening. This relationship has come to be better understood since around ...
Marine geological studies were of extreme importance in providing the critical evidence for sea floor spreading and plate tectonics in the years following World War II. The deep ocean floor is the last essentially unexplored frontier and detailed mapping in support of economic ( petroleum and metal mining ), natural disaster mitigation, and ...
A propagating rift is a seafloor feature associated with spreading centers at mid-ocean ridges and back-arc basins. [1] They are more commonly observed on faster rate spreading centers (50 mm/year or more). [2] These features are formed by the lengthening of one spreading segment at the expense of an offset neighboring spreading segment. [3]
Plate tectonics and seafloor spreading (plate divergence/convergence) and change in seafloor elevation (mid-ocean volcanism) Eustatic: 0.01 mm/yr Marine sedimentation: Eustatic < 0.01 mm/yr Change in mass of ocean water Melting or accumulation of continental ice: Eustatic: 10 mm/yr • Climate changes during the 20th century •• Antarctica ...
Robert Sinclair Dietz (September 14, 1914 – May 19, 1995) was an American scientist with the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey.Dietz, born in Westfield, New Jersey, [1] was a marine geologist, geophysicist and oceanographer who conducted pioneering research along with Harry Hammond Hess concerning seafloor spreading, published as early as 1960–1961.
The model builds on the concept of continental drift, an idea developed during the first decades of the 20th century. Plate tectonics came to be accepted by geoscientists after seafloor spreading was validated in the mid-to-late 1960s.