droppedImage

The mantle transition zone is thin over an area ~100 km in radius centered ~40 km SW of the island of Fernandina. => This anomaly is consistent with an excess temperature of 130 ± 60 K.

Active volcanism in the Galápagos occurs to the east and north.

  1. 1.The ascending mantle is transported north to the Galápagos spreading center by plume-ridge interactions.

  2. 2.The ascending mantle is spreads out both eastward and westward beneath the Nazca plate

Publications

*Byrnes, J.S., E.E.E. Hooft, D.R. Toomey, D.R. Villagómez, D.M. Geist, S.C. Solomon, An upper mantle seismic discontinuity beneath the Galápagos Archipelago and its implications for studies of the lithosphere-asthenosphere boundary, Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems, doi: 10.1003/2014Gc005694, 2015.

*Villagómez D.R., D.R. Toomey, D.J. Geist, E.E.E. Hooft, S.C. Solomon, Seismic imaging reveals mantle flow and multistage melting beneath the Galápagos, Nature Geoscience, doi: 10.1038/NGEO2062, 2014.

*Villagómez D.R., D.R. Toomey, E.E.E. Hooft, S.C. Solomon, Crustal structure beneath the Galápagos Archipelago from ambient noise tomography and its implications for plume-lithosphere interactions, J. Geophys. Res., 116, B04310, doi:10.1029/2010JB007764, 2011.

Villagómez, D. R., D. R. Toomey, E. E. E. Hooft, and S. C. Solomon, Upper mantle structure beneath the Galápagos Archipelago from surface wave tomography, J. Geophys. Res., 112, B07303, doi:10.1029/2006JB004672, 2007.

Fontaine, F., E.E.E. Hooft, P. Burkett, D.R. Toomey, S.C. Solomon, and P.G. Silver, Shear-wave Splitting Beneath the Galápagos Archipelago, Geophys. Res. Lett., 32, doi:10.1029/2005GL024014, 2005.

Hooft E.E.E., D.R. Toomey, and S.C. Solomon, Anomalously Thin Transition Zone Beneath the Galápagos Hotspot, Earth Planet. Sci. Lett., 216, 55-64, 2003.

Hooft Toomey, E.E.E., Toomey, D.R., Solomon, S.C., James, D.E. and Hall, M.L., Crustal Thickness Variations and Internal Structure of the Galápagos Archipelago, Eos Trans. AGU, 82, T42B-0939, 2001.

Toomey, D.R., E.E.E. Hooft Toomey, S.C. Solomon, D.E. James, and M.L. Hall, Seismic Evidence for a Plume Beneath the Galápagos Hotspot, Eos Trans. AGU, 83 (47), 2002.