Tectonics articles from across Nature Portfolio

The Isua Supercrustal Belt in Greenland hosts sedimentary rocks that were deposited 3.7 billion years ago in the forearc environment of an active convergent plate boundary, suggesting subduction-related plate tectonics in the Eoarchean, as indicated by geochemical data and tectonostratigraphic analyses of an 80-m drill core.

Isotope and element geochemistry of lavas from the Philippine Sea Plate and west Pacific marginal basin reveal the boundaries between mantle domains and indicate the Zealandia-Antarctic domain is three times larger than previously believed.

A 3D stochastic declustering algorithm, applied to data from the dense seismic array at the Alto Tiberina Fault system, Italy, suggests the difference between earthquake size distributions of independent and triggered seismicity is not an artifact.

Recent sequences of reverse-faulting earthquakes at the Mid-Atlantic Ridge and the Carlsberg Ridge show that tectonic extension at mid-ocean ridge axes can be partially undone by tectonic shortening across the ridge flanks.

Analyses of a detailed microearthquake catalog highlights the complexity of the faults ruptured during the shallow 2020 Sparta North Carolina earthquake and identifies a likely nucleation point near the intersection of a reverse fault and a blind strike-slip fault.

Compositional and structural variations within Earth’s lower mantle are a complex puzzle to which seismic data hold clues.

A model investigating the build-up of the atmosphere of Venus shows that it could have originated from a vigorous phase akin to plate tectonics during the first billion years of its evolution.

There are two competing hypotheses for the origin of oceanic plateaus: plume versus plate. Thermodynamic modelling of magmatism at Shatsky Rise, in the Pacific Ocean, now suggests that neither mechanism is adequate on its own and in fact plume–ridge interaction is required to explain the formation of this ocean plateau.

An article in Science Advances uses Si and O isotopes of Earth’s oldest rocks to identify the onset of crustal recycling, with potential implications for the onset of subduction-like tectonics.

During the February 2023 Turkey-Syria earthquakes, people looked for explanations. As scientists, we did our best to share our knowledge in a way that reached and connected with people beyond the scientific community.

Alba Rodriguez Padilla explains how airborne lidar can capture 3D submeter to tens of meters changes in surface topography caused by earthquake deformation.