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All scales must be considered to understand rifts

Feedbacks between chemical, physical, and biological processes at rift zones evolve through various time (seconds to 107 yrs) and spatial (microns to 106 m) scales. Consideration of these scales is needed to tap rift energy, water, and mineral resources safely and equitably while preserving biodiversity in these changing settings.

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Fig. 1: Structure and timescales of rifting.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank Einat Aharanov for stimulating discussions of fluid and gas processes. CJE and JVW acknowledge NSF grant OCE 2025577. This is Los Alamos National Laboratory contribution LA-UR-23-21602.

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Correspondence to Cynthia Ebinger.

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Ebinger, C., van Wijk, J., Olaka, L. et al. All scales must be considered to understand rifts. Nat Rev Earth Environ 4, 209–210 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s43017-023-00408-x

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