Nature, Vol.382, No.6589, 344-346, 1996
2-Way Exchange Between the Easter Mantle Plume and the Easter Microplate Spreading Axis
THE conventional model whereby plume volcanism forms linear age-progressive volcanic chains, with the youngest activity occurring nearest a spreading axis (at a ’hotspot’), has been challenged for the Easter seamount chain(1-4). Whereas early work suggested the existence of a linear melting anomaly (a ’hotline’)(1,2) more recent studies(3,4) have proposed a hotspot near Salas y Gomez island, connected with the Easter microplate spreading system by an