Locations Of Sea Floor Spreading

Seafloor spreading helps to explain continental drift in the theory of plate tectonics.

Locations of sea floor spreading.

The formation of the new crust is due to the rising of the molten material magma from the mantle by convection current. Seafloor spreading occurs along mid ocean ridges large mountain ranges rising from the ocean floor. Lab activity 2 6 recognizing seafloor spreading there are several locations on the earth where seafloor spreading takes place. The depth age relation can be modeled by the cooling of a lithosphere plate or mantle half.

This idea played a pivotal role in the development of the theory of plate tectonics which revolutionized geologic thought during the last quarter of the 20th century. When oceanic plates diverge tensional stress causes fractures to occur in the lithosphere. Seafloor spreading theory that oceanic crust forms along submarine mountain zones and spreads out laterally away from them. The oceanic crust is composed of rocks that move away from the ridge as new crust is being formed.

On the ridge flanks the depth of the seafloor or the height of a location on a mid ocean ridge above a base level is correlated with its age age of the lithosphere where depth is measured. The process of sea floor spreading. At the spreading center on a mid ocean ridge the depth of the seafloor is approximately 2 600 meters 8 500 ft. The mid ocean ridge is the region where new oceanic crust is created.

The mid atlantic ridge for instance separates the north american plate from the eurasian plate and the south american plate from the african plate the east pacific rise is a mid ocean ridge that runs through the eastern pacific ocean and separates the pacific plate from the north american. In locations where two plates move apart at mid ocean ridges new seafloor is continually formed during seafloor spreading.