Nature & Environment
Scientists Discover Largest Volcano on Earth Beneath the Pacific Ocean
Sam Goodwin
First Posted: Sep 06, 2013 08:13 AM EDT
Researchers from the University of Houston have been successful in uncovering what is now known as the largest single volcano on Earth and the second largest in the Solar system.
Researchers from the University of Houston made a startling discovery Thursday, when they uncovered the largest single volcano on Earth and second largest in the Solar system. The volcano, found underwater in the Pacific Ocean, has been named Tamu Massif and is said to be as big as the state of Mexico. It is comparable to the giant volcanoes of Mars.
Tamu covers 120,000 square miles, which dwarfs the 2,000 square-mile coverage of Hawaii's Mauna Loa, the largest volcano on Earth's surface. This land volcano is only two percent of the size of Tamu.
"Tamu Massif is the biggest single shield volcano ever discovered on Earth," William Sager, a professor in the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at UH, who has been studying the volcano for 20 years, said in a press release. "There may be larger volcanoes, because there are bigger igneous features out there such as the Ontong Java Plateau, but we don't know if these features are one volcano or complexes of volcanoes."
The volcano has a "broad, low" configuration suggesting that lava from the volcano was free to flow out of it and cover large distances.
"It's not high, but very wide, so the flank slopes are very gradual," Sager said. "In fact, if you were standing on its flank, you would have trouble telling which way is downhill. We know that it is a single immense volcano constructed from massive lava flows that emanated from the center of the volcano to form a broad, shield-like shape. Before now, we didn't know this because oceanic plateaus are huge features hidden beneath the sea. They have found a good place to hide."
Though the volcano has not been active for years, this new discovery can help scientists better understand how these large structure form. The fact that this newly discovered volcano bears a different shape than other previously discovered sub-marine volcano found on Earth has made this discovery all the more interesting.
"An immense amount of magma came from the center, and this magma had to have come from the Earth's mantle," the authors concluded. "So this is important information for geologists trying to understand how the Earth's interior works."
See Now:
NASA's Juno Spacecraft's Rendezvous With Jupiter's Mammoth Cyclone
©2024 ScienceWorldReport.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission. The window to the world of science news.
More on SCIENCEwr
First Posted: Sep 06, 2013 08:13 AM EDT
Researchers from the University of Houston have been successful in uncovering what is now known as the largest single volcano on Earth and the second largest in the Solar system.
Researchers from the University of Houston made a startling discovery Thursday, when they uncovered the largest single volcano on Earth and second largest in the Solar system. The volcano, found underwater in the Pacific Ocean, has been named Tamu Massif and is said to be as big as the state of Mexico. It is comparable to the giant volcanoes of Mars.
Tamu covers 120,000 square miles, which dwarfs the 2,000 square-mile coverage of Hawaii's Mauna Loa, the largest volcano on Earth's surface. This land volcano is only two percent of the size of Tamu.
"Tamu Massif is the biggest single shield volcano ever discovered on Earth," William Sager, a professor in the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at UH, who has been studying the volcano for 20 years, said in a press release. "There may be larger volcanoes, because there are bigger igneous features out there such as the Ontong Java Plateau, but we don't know if these features are one volcano or complexes of volcanoes."
The volcano has a "broad, low" configuration suggesting that lava from the volcano was free to flow out of it and cover large distances.
"It's not high, but very wide, so the flank slopes are very gradual," Sager said. "In fact, if you were standing on its flank, you would have trouble telling which way is downhill. We know that it is a single immense volcano constructed from massive lava flows that emanated from the center of the volcano to form a broad, shield-like shape. Before now, we didn't know this because oceanic plateaus are huge features hidden beneath the sea. They have found a good place to hide."
Though the volcano has not been active for years, this new discovery can help scientists better understand how these large structure form. The fact that this newly discovered volcano bears a different shape than other previously discovered sub-marine volcano found on Earth has made this discovery all the more interesting.
"An immense amount of magma came from the center, and this magma had to have come from the Earth's mantle," the authors concluded. "So this is important information for geologists trying to understand how the Earth's interior works."
See Now: NASA's Juno Spacecraft's Rendezvous With Jupiter's Mammoth Cyclone