This study is led by Prof. Zhong-Hai Li (University of Chinese Academy of Sciences). The present solid Earth is actually active, with new plates generating in the mid-ocean ridges and some old plates ...

A new study, resorting to computational models, predicts that a subduction zone currently below the Gibraltar Strait will propagate further inside the Atlantic and contribute to forming an Atlantic ...

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 ...

Earth was mostly devoid of oxygen for much of its 4.5 billion year lifetime. That is, until certain processes started to allow for the eventual buildup of oxygen up to the levels we have now (around ...

Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. David Bressan is a geologist who covers curiosities about Earth. Oct 29, 2025, 03:16pm EDT Nov 01, 2025, 01:11pm EDT For the first ...

Several billion-year-old rocks tell the story of the planet’s transition from alien landscape to one of continents, oceans, and ultimately life A new study from scientists at Scripps Institution of ...

Subduction zones mark the boundaries where one lithospheric plate descends beneath another into the mantle, driving a suite of tectonic, thermal and fluid-mediated processes. As oceanic crust is ...

Hundreds of millions of people live along the edges of the Pacific Ocean, directly above tectonic boundaries that produce the ...

Geophysicists can use a new model to explain the behavior of a tectonic plate sinking into a subduction zone in the Earth's mantle: the plate becomes weak and thus more deformable when mineral grains ...

Get unlimited access to ad-free articles and exclusive content. LiveScience A budding subduction zone offshore of Spain heralds the start of a new cycle that will one day pull the Atlantic Ocean ...

Map highlighting the Atlantic subduction zones, the fully developed Lesser Antilles and Scotia arcs on the western side and the incipient Gibraltar arc on the eastern side. From Duarte et al., 2018.