Sea Floor Spreading And Subduction Diagram

This idea played a pivotal role in the development of the theory of plate tectonics which revolutionized geologic thought during the last quarter of the 20th century.

Sea floor spreading and subduction diagram.

At subduction zones the edge of the denser plate subducts or slides beneath the less dense one. Subduction zone the area in which one part of the earth s crust a plate is pushed underneath another plate as the two plates collide. Spreading rate is the rate at which an ocean basin widens due to seafloor spreading. The purpose of this activity is to make a simple model that shows the evolution of oceanic crust through sea floor spreading and subduction.

The creation of new sea floor at mid ocean spreading centers and its destruction in subduction zones is one of the many cycles that causes the earth to experience constant change. 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. The denser lithospheric material then melts back into the earth s mantle. This report describes how to build a model of the outer 300 km 180 miles of the earth that can be used to develop a better understanding of the principal features of plate tectonics including sea floor spreading the pattern of magnetic stripes frozen into the sea floor transform faulting thrust faulting subduction and volcanism.

Due to this continuous seafloor spreading occurs and makes atlantic ocean floor to be connected to other continental crust making the ocean gets wider over the time. Ocean large bodies of water sitting atop oceanic crust. Oceanic crust thin parts of the earth s crust located under the oceans. Subduction happens where tectonic plates crash into each other instead of spreading apart.

These age data also allow the rate of seafloor spreading to be determined and they show that rates. For instance the atlantic ocean is believed to be expanding because of its few trenches. Subduction is a geological process that takes place at convergent boundaries of tectonic plates where one plate moves under another and is forced to sink due to high gravitational potential energy into the mantle. Seafloor spreading is just one part of plate tectonics.

Spreading rates determine if the ridge is fast intermediate or slow. Seafloor spreading theory that oceanic crust forms along submarine mountain zones and spreads out laterally away from them. As upwelling of magma continues the plates continue to diverge a process known as seafloor spreading samples collected from the ocean floor show that the age of oceanic crust increases with distance from the spreading centre important evidence in favour of this process.