Eos · 2006 · 37 citations · 6 references
Natural SciencesEarth SciencesGeophysicsPlanetary GeologyTectonicsTectonophysicsContinental Margin GeologyContinental Margin StructureMantle GeochemistryMantle PetrologyPlanetary Mantle DynamicsPlate TectonicsAgglomerationArchean OceansBuoyancyContinental TectonicsCore-mantle Boundary ProcessesCratonic MantleMeltingUpper Mantle Structure
It is generally accepted that the cores of the continents, called cratons, formed by the accretion of island arcs into proto‐continents and then by proto‐continental agglomeration to form the large continental masses. Mantle‐wedge processes, combined with higher melting temperatures during the Archean (2.5–3.8 billion years ago) and possibly thrust stacking of highly depleted Archean oceanic lithosphere, produced a strong, buoyant, upper mantle chemical boundary layer. This stabilizing mantle layer, known as the tectosphere, has shielded the Archean cratons from most subsequent tectonic disruption and is highly depleted in iron, providing the positive buoyancy that is required to ‘float’ the continents more than four kilometers above the surrounding ocean basins.
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Tectonic Evolution of the Caribbean
Kevin Burke · Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences · 1988 · 415 citations
A plate-kinematic framework for models of Caribbean evolution
James Pindell, S. C. Cande, Walter C. Pitman et al. · Tectonophysics · 1988 · 386 citations