Decrease in oceanic crustal thickness since the breakup of pangaea

ABSTRACT Earth’s mantle has cooled by 6–11 °C every 100 million years since the Archaean, 2.5 billion years ago. In more recent times, the surface heat loss that led to this temperature drop

may have been enhanced by plate-tectonic processes, such as continental breakup, the continuous creation of oceanic lithosphere at mid-ocean ridges and subduction at deep-sea trenches. Here

we use a compilation of marine seismic refraction data from ocean basins globally to analyse changes in the thickness of oceanic crust over time. We find that oceanic crust formed in the

mid-Jurassic, about 170 million years ago, is 1.7 km thicker on average than crust produced along the present-day mid-ocean ridge system. If a higher mantle temperature is the cause of

thicker Jurassic ocean crust, the upper mantle may have cooled by 15–20 °C per 100 million years over this time period. The difference between this and the long-term mantle cooling rate

indeed suggests that modern plate tectonics coincide with greater mantle heat loss. We also find that the increase of ocean crustal thickness with plate age is stronger in the Indian and

Atlantic oceans compared with the Pacific Ocean. This observation supports the idea that upper mantle temperature in the Jurassic was higher in the wake of the fragmented supercontinent

Pangaea due to the effect of continental insulation. Access through your institution Buy or subscribe This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution ACCESS OPTIONS

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institutional subscriptions * Read our FAQs * Contact customer support SIMILAR CONTENT BEING VIEWED BY OTHERS HIGHLY VARIABLE MAGMATIC ACCRETION AT THE ULTRASLOW-SPREADING GAKKEL RIDGE

Article Open access 21 August 2024 IGNITION OF THE SOUTHERN ATLANTIC SEAFLOOR SPREADING MACHINE WITHOUT HOT-MANTLE BOOSTER Article Open access 21 January 2023 SEISMIC EVIDENCE FOR UNIFORM

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Download references ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS H.J.A.V.A. and J.L.H. received funding for this research from the National Science Foundation (grant OCE-1348454). J.K.D. and L.A.L. were supported by

the PLATES project at the Institute for Geophysics. We thank L. Lavier for discussions of this work. This is UTIG contribution 3013. AUTHOR INFORMATION AUTHORS AND AFFILIATIONS * University

of Texas Institute for Geophysics, Jackson School of Geosciences, Austin, Texas 78758, USA Harm J. A. Van Avendonk, Joshua K. Davis, Jennifer L. Harding & Lawrence A. Lawver Authors *

Harm J. A. Van Avendonk View author publications You can also search for this author inPubMed Google Scholar * Joshua K. Davis View author publications You can also search for this author

inPubMed Google Scholar * Jennifer L. Harding View author publications You can also search for this author inPubMed Google Scholar * Lawrence A. Lawver View author publications You can also

search for this author inPubMed Google Scholar CONTRIBUTIONS H.J.A.V.A. and J.L.H. compiled the marine seismic refraction data from the science literature. J.K.D. and L.A.L. carried out

plate-tectonic reconstructions. H.J.A.V.A. wrote the paper with contributions and edits from all other authors. CORRESPONDING AUTHOR Correspondence to Harm J. A. Van Avendonk. ETHICS

DECLARATIONS COMPETING INTERESTS The authors declare no competing financial interests. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION Supplementary Information (PDF 1028 kb)

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_et al._ Decrease in oceanic crustal thickness since the breakup of Pangaea. _Nature Geosci_ 10, 58–61 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo2849 Download citation * Received: 22 June 2016 *

Accepted: 02 November 2016 * Published: 12 December 2016 * Issue Date: January 2017 * DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo2849 SHARE THIS ARTICLE Anyone you share the following link with will

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