Groundbreaking Discovery of Hidden Molten Rock Layer Under Earth's Tectonic Plates - SciTechDaily

A diagram of the asthenosphere, which aids plate tectonics, where researchers at the UT Austin Jackson School of Geosciences say they detected a global layer of partial melt (shown in speckled red).

According to the research, which Hua began as a graduate student at Brown University, the convection of heat and rock in the mantle are the prevailing influence on the motion of the plates.

Showing that the melt layer has no influence on plate tectonics means one less tricky variable for computer models of the Earth, said coauthor Thorsten Becker, a professor at the Jackson School.

“We can’t rule out that locally melt doesn’t matter,” said Becker, who designs geodynamic models of the Earth at the Jackson School’s University of Texas Institute for Geophysics.

Intrigued by signs of partly molten rock under the crust, Hua compiled similar images from other seismic stations until he had a global map of the asthenosphere.

Reference: “Asthenospheric low-velocity zone consistent with globally prevalent partial melting” by Junlin Hua, Karen M. Fischer, Thorsten W. Becker, Esteban Gazel and Greg Hirth, 6 February 2023, Nature Geoscience.