What Is Ocean Floor Spreading

The seafloor s permanent magnetic signatures showed that new ocean crust was created at the ridge crests and then spread outward in both directions.

What is ocean floor spreading.

As upwelling of magma continues the plates continue to diverge a process known as seafloor spreading samples collected from the ocean floor show that the age of oceanic crust increases with distance from the spreading centre important evidence in favour of this process. The oceanic crust is composed of rocks that move away from the ridge as new crust is being formed. Seafloor spreading definition a process in which new ocean floor is created as molten material from the earth s mantle rises in margins between plates or ridges and spreads out. Spreading rates determine if the ridge is fast intermediate or slow.

These age data also allow the rate of seafloor spreading to be determined and they show that rates. Seafloor spreading occurs along mid ocean ridges large mountain ranges rising from the ocean floor. The formation of the new crust is due to the rising of the molten material magma from the mantle by convection current. The continents bordering the atlantic ocean for example are believed to be moving away from the mid atlantic ridge at a rate of 1 2 cm 0 4 0 8 inch per year thus increasing.

The rate at which new oceanic lithosphere is added to each tectonic plate on either side of a mid ocean ridge is the spreading half rate and is equal to half of the spreading rate. Look it up now. The stripes ran parallel to the mid ocean ridges and extended out hundreds of miles on either side of them. 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.

Spreading rate is the rate at which an ocean basin widens due to seafloor spreading. Seafloor spreading definition is the divergence at mid ocean ridges of the tectonic plates underlying the oceans that is due to upwelling from the earth s interior of magma which solidifies and adds to the spreading plates. The youngest crust of the ocean floor can be found near the seafloor spreading centers or mid ocean ridges as the plates split apart magma rises from below the earth s surface to fill in the empty void.