The role of mantle plumes in continental breakup: case histories from Gondwanaland

After thirty years of plate-tectonic theory, the reasons why supercontinents disintegrate and disperse to form smaller continental plates remain enigmatic. Possible causes range from abnormally hot mantle upwellings, or plumes, to changes in plate-boundary driving forces. The breakup of the Gondwana...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Nature (London) 1995-09, Vol.377 (6547), p.301-308
Main Author: Storey, Bryan C.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Earth sciences
Earth, ocean, space
Exact sciences and technology
Humanities and Social Sciences
Internal geophysics
Marine
multidisciplinary
Plate tectonics
review-article
Science
Science (multidisciplinary)
Solid-earth geophysics, tectonophysics, gravimetry
Tectonics. Structural geology. Plate tectonics
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Summary:After thirty years of plate-tectonic theory, the reasons why supercontinents disintegrate and disperse to form smaller continental plates remain enigmatic. Possible causes range from abnormally hot mantle upwellings, or plumes, to changes in plate-boundary driving forces. The breakup of the Gondwanaland super-continent, which started about 180 million years ago, provides an excellent case history against which to test models.
ISSN:0028-0836
1476-4687
DOI:10.1038/377301a0