The Earth is made up of different layers: Therefore, instead of tectonic plates moving because of the convection currents ... tectonic plates sink into the mantle at subduction zones.

Alternatively, as shown in the diagram, convection currents under the Earth’s crust transfer heat, which rises through the surface and cools back down in a circular motion. The convection ...

The crust of volcanically active Venus could be churning with convection currents just like the Earth's mantle. This is the conclusion of researchers from the Washington University in St. Louis, who ...

A massive volcanic ridge beneath the Indian Ocean has just delivered a major surprise to geologists. According to a new study published in Nature Communications, the Kerguelen hotspot—the volcanic ...

It is unlikely that the Earth's mantle — the layer beneath the crust and above the core — was completely homogeneous when it initially formed. Over time, cooling-induced convection as well as ...

The plates make up Earth's outer shell, called the lithosphere. (This includes the crust and uppermost part of the mantle.) Churning currents in the molten rocks below propel them along like a ...

An ancient slab of Earth's crust buried deep beneath the Midwest is sucking huge swatches of present-day's North American crust down into the mantle, researchers say. The slab's pull has created ...

The large low velocity provinces (LLVPs) in the deep Earth mantle may be relics of Theian mantle materials. News organizations may use or redistribute this image, with proper attribution ...

Convection is the process that drives hot currents of gas or liquid upwards ... which can't sink into the Earth's dense mantle. For at least 80 million years the oceanic Indian Plate continued ...

But as a result of being the most ancient pieces of Earth’s lithosphere (containing the crust and uppermost mantle), they aren’t subjected to nearly as much geologic dynamism as is found ...