Mid atlantic ridge is what kind of fault

This discovery also led to new theories in terms of geology and planetary evolution. Similar to convergent boundaries, subduction zones and other geological forces, the process that created it is also responsible for the world as we know it today.

Basically, it is responsible for the fact that the Americas have been drifting away from Africa and Eurasia for millions of years, the formation of Australia, and the collision between the India Subcontinent and Asia. We have written many interesting articles about Earth here at Universe Today. Astronomy Cast also has episodes that are relevant to the subject. Skip to content. Like this: Like Loading One is a "normal fault," where a higher block is climbing up in relation to the lower one.

To help in their problem solving, scientists create working hypotheses to test against the evidence they collect. One working hypothesis is that this mountain's tallest part, a north-south pointing ridge more than 3, meters 12, feet above the ocean floor, is the upwardly moving block of a normal fault.

Flash: Normal Fault In a normal fault, the block above the fault plane moves down. A detachment fault is a special kind of normal fault. Those corrugations dip towards a back-tilted ridge that is lower than the first one.

Looking at the bathymetric map made by sonar returns during Blackman's and Cann's earlier expedition, it's easy to envision those furrows as the tracks left on the higher block as it pushes out from under the lower one. Mid-ocean ridges are geologically important because they occur along the kind of plate boundary where new ocean floor is created as the plates spread apart. Thus the mid-ocean ridge is also known as a "spreading center" or a "divergent plate boundary.

As oceanic plates move apart, rock melts and wells up from tens of kilometers deep. Some of the molten rock ascends all the way up to the seafloor, producing enormous volcanic eruptions of basalt, and building the longest chain of volcanoes in the world! The molten rock that does not erupt freezes onto the edges of the plates as they spread apart. In , a segment of the ridge which emerges above sea-level in Iceland erupted more than 12 cubic kilometers of lava- enough to pave the entire U.

A big picture cross section showing melt molten rock in the upper mantle beneath the East Pacific Rise. Melt extends over kilometers deep below oceanic crust, and spans a breadth of several hundred kilometers. Since most of the mid-ocean ridge is more than meters deep, most of its eruptions go unnoticed.

In fact, accurate maps along the mid-ocean ridge did not exist until the last ten years, and even now much of it remains unmapped. Accurate maps that exist along portions of the mid-ocean ridge show that the zone of recent volcanic activity is narrow, less than 10 km and often less than 1 km wide. This region generating new ocean floor is also characterized by many small to moderate earthquakes. Some of these earthquakes are caused by volcanic eruptions, and others are caused by breaking and ripping of the thin, newly created plate as it spreads to either side of the ridge.

Two of the most carefully studied mid-ocean ridges are the Mid-Atlantic Ridge and the East Pacific Rise called a rise because it has more gentle slopes. It spread apart at rates of 2 to 5 cm per year, and at these relatively slow spreading rates, the ridge has a deep rift valley along its crest. The rift valley is 1 to 3 km deep, about the depth and width of the Grand Canyon.

What is a mid-ocean ridge simple definition? What two processes occur at mid-ocean ridges? What is the main feature that is found along the center of mid-ocean ridges? How is magma created at mid-ocean ridges?

What do you expect to find at a mid-ocean ridge answer? Where are some transform boundaries? Which kind of boundary is found at these earthquake locations? What happens at a convergent boundary?