Detachment faults at Mid‐Ocean Ridges garner interest

Abstract

The recent discovery of low‐angle faults known as detachments on the Mid‐Atlantic Ridge requires a major reevaluation of how the oceanic crust forms at slow spreading ridges. Detachment faults can expose large areas of plutonic and ultramafic rocks on the seafloor, without an overlying volcanic carapace. They could profoundly influence the thermal structure, rheology, composition, and style of magmatic accretion at ridges. Oceanic detachments have many parallels with continental detachment faults, with the added advantage that the morphology of the fault surface is pristine, unaffected by subareal erosion.