Note to users. If you're seeing this message, it means that your browser cannot find this page's style/presentation instructions -- or possibly that you are using a browser that does not support current Web standards. Find out more about why this message is appearing, and what you can do to make your experience of our site the best it can be.

Site Tools

  • AAAS
  • Subscribe
  • Feedback

Site Search

Search Advanced

Science 4 October 2002:
Vol. 298. no. 5591, p. 9
DOI: 10.1126/science.298.5591.9g
Prev | Table of Contents | Next

This Week in Science

The motions of plates on Earth's surface are believed to be coupled to convection in the mantle. Conrad and Lithgow-Bertelloni (p. 207) consider two subducted slab mechanisms, slab pull in the upper mantle, where the subducted slab is attached to the plate and pulls the subducting plate faster than normal toward the subduction zone, and slab suction in the lower mantle, where the subducted slab is detached from the plate and sucks the plate toward the subduction zone by enhanced mantle flow. A plate tectonic simulation with suction and pull reproduces the observed plate tectonic motions and resolves some of the difficulties in understanding the coupling of crust to mantle.




To Advertise     Find Products

Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)