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Earth science

The mantle's lava lamp

Nature volume 402, pages 739–740 (1999)Cite this article

Almost all geological observations at Earth's surface can be explained by the relative drift and interaction of tectonic plates. The two exceptions are hotspots (isolated points of high melt delivery to Earth's surface, such as Hawaii) and superswells (clusters of midplate hotspots on very broad topographical domes, such as French Polynesia). Hotspots and superswells offer the best clues as to the dynamic state of Earth's mantle. As described by Davaille on page 756 of this issue1, their essential features have for the first time been reproduced in laboratory experiments of convection scaled to Earth-like conditions.

Previous numerical and laboratory simulations of mantle convection have failed to re-create the broad (several thousands of kilometres), oscillatory upwellings necessary to produce superswells, as determined from modelling of geophysical data2. Narrow plume-type upwellings that could explain hotspots are readily produced in models with sharp temperature gradients separating convecting layers of different density, the most dramatic of which must occur at the core–mantle boundary. But plumes originating at the core–mantle boundary should be much hotter than the temperatures inferred from geochemical analyses of hotspot lavas3.

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Figure 1: Thermochemical convection in Earth's mantle as it might be now, inferred from Davaille's laboratory simulations1 with a buoyancy ratio of <0.5.

References

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  1. the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, Moss Landing, 95039, California, USA

    Marcia McNutt

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  1. Marcia McNutt
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Correspondence to Marcia McNutt.

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McNutt, M. The mantle's lava lamp. Nature 402, 739–740 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1038/45416

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