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Science 29 November 2002:
Vol. 298. no. 5599, pp. 1765 - 1768
DOI: 10.1126/science.1077950
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Reports

Seismotectonics of Mid-Ocean Ridge Propagation in Hess Deep

Jacqueline S. Floyd,12* Maya Tolstoy,2 John C. Mutter,123 Christopher H. Scholz12

Hydroacoustic data from the eastern equatorial Pacific reveal low-magnitude seismicity concentrated at the propagating tip of the Galapagos Rise in Hess Deep. The patterns of seismicity and faulting are similar to those observed in the process zone of laboratory-scale propagating tensile cracks. Because the fracture energy required for propagation scales with crack length and process zone size, it follows that ridges can propagate stably in the brittle crust without exceptional resisting forces as proposed by previous models based on linear elastic fracture mechanics.

1 Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences,
2 Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory,
3 Earth Institute, Columbia University, 61 Route 9W, Palisades, NY 10964, USA.
*   To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: jsfloyd{at}ldeo.columbia.edu

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THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES:
Cracking of lithosphere north of the Galapagos triple junction.
H. Schouten, D. K. Smith, L. G.J. Montesi, W. Zhu, and E. M. Klein (2008)
Geology 36, 339-342
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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)