subduction

Comparisons of definitions, favorable conditions and natural cases between hot and cold subduction initiation. Credit: Science China Press The present solid Earth is actually active, with new plates generating in the mid-ocean ridges and some old plates sinking back into the interior through subduction zones. Subduction is thus a key process of the tectonics and geodynamics of the Earth. However, the formation mechanism of a…

Maps showing the evolution of the Gibraltar subduction zone from 30 million years ago to 50 million years into the future. From Duarte et al., 2024. Credit: João C. Duarte Our planet's lithosphere is broken into several tectonic plates. Their configuration is ever-shifting as supercontinents are assembled and broken up, and oceans form, grow, and then start to close in what is known as the Wilson cycle.…

Image of supercritical fluids in the minerals studied. Credit: Prof. Xiao’s group In a study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Prof. Xiao Yilin's group from the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) quantitatively determined, for the first time, the chemical composition of supercritical fluids in deep subduction zones. Through 3D imaging…

Schematic of major instrumental arrays and activities of SZ4D. Credit: Carnegie Institution for Science A new report, co-authored by Carnegie's Diana Roman, presents a plan for an ambitious interdisciplinary initiative aimed at advancing understanding of the processes that trigger earthquakes, tsunamis, landslides, and volcanic eruptions where tectonic plates converge. …

Water input to the mantle at the Mariana Trench subduction zone, located at the center of this global map of subduction zones, may have been previously underestimated. Credit: Background image by USGS, overlay bathymetry figure by Chen et al., Public Domain On the surface, subduction zones manifest as oceanic trenches, the deepest of which is the Mariana Trench in the Pacific Ocean. One notable feature of many trenches is…

Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain A novel three-dimensional model of the fluid stored deep in Earth's crust along the Cascadia Subduction Zone provides new insight into how the accumulation and release of those fluids may influence seismic activity in the region. …

Schematic plot illustrating the cross section of typical settings for serpentinite mud volcanoes in Mariana forearc. Credit: IOCAS A research team led by Prof. Sun Weidong from the Institute of Oceanology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (IOCAS) has revealed the fluid-rock interactions at a shallow subduction zone in the Mariana forearc.…