Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Magmatic Subsidence Of The East Pacific Rise (Epr) At 18˚14'S Revealed Through Fault Restoration Of Ridge Crest Bathymetry, S M. Carbotte, William B F Ryan, Wen Jin, Marie-Helene Cormier, Eric Bergmanis, John Sinton, Scott M. White

Faculty Publications

The fault restoration technique of De Chabalier and Avouac [1994] is applied to an ultra-highresolution bathymetry data set from the East Pacific Rise (EPR) at 18140S. Fault offsets are calculated and subtracted from the original seafloor bathymetry to examine the morphology of the unfaulted seafloor surface within an area encompassing the ridge axis 400 [1] 1600 m in dimension. The restored topography reveals a gently sloping seafloor 200 m wide, which slopes 5 inward toward the spreading axis. We attribute this inward sloping seafloor to subsidence within the axial trough due to subsurface magmatic deflation. The vertical deformation field extracted …