The study was carried out by Senior Research Scientist Shiki Machida of the Next Generation Marine Resources Research Center at Chiba Institute of Technology, Professor Kyoko Okino of the University of Tokyo, and collaborators from the National Museum of Nature and Science. The team analyzed lava samples from the Central Indian Ridge to quantify the mixing behavior of plume-fed mantle.
Chemical signatures in the lava showed that the heterogeneity originated from recycled oceanic crust that had sunk deep into the Earth and was later brought upward by mantle plumes. Tracking the evolution of lava composition as the mid-ocean ridge shifted with plate motion allowed the scientists to pinpoint the spatial scale of variation.
The results indicate a scale of less than 10 kilometers-roughly an order of magnitude smaller than the 100-kilometer estimates derived from seismic wave studies. The findings suggest that mantle materials undergo faster and finer mixing than previously assumed, reshaping perspectives on how the deep Earth recycles its components.
"This achievement provides a new perspective on our understanding of the Earth's internal structure and offers clues to the processes of material recycling within the Earth's interior, akin to a form of metabolism," the researchers noted.
Research Report:Analyses across a mid-ocean ridge give the scale of plume-fed heterogeneity
Related Links
Next Generation Marine Resources Research Center, Chiba Institute of Technology
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