Research Group Gürer Tectonics & Geodynamics
Earth is the only planet that we know of with active plate tectonics, manifested in the motion and deformation of continents and the formation and destruction of ocean basins. The sites at which oceanic lithosphere sinks into the mantle, subduction zones, are considered the primary engine of plate tectonics on Earth. In driving plate tectonics, they enable unique environmental conditions, making Earth the only known habitable planet.
At the same time, subduction zones cause some of the most devastating earthquakes, tsunamis, and the majority of volcanic eruptions. Despite numerous advances since the theory of plate tectonics was established, the mechanisms controlling the formation and stability of subduction zones today, and back in deep geologic time, remain enigmatic. This is because Earth’s oceanic lithosphere is continually being
recycled through subduction and our constraints on this fundamental process are progressively lost with time. There are many potential explanations for subduction initiation. Subduction zones
could initiate from a spontaneous gravitational collapse of the aging oceanic lithosphere; or form due to sudden stress changes in response to the arrival of buoyant features such as continents, oceanic plateaus, or volcanic arcs in trenches. Mantle plumes and regional to global changes in mantle flow have also been suggested as drivers of subduction initiation. The most fundamental result of the last decade of tectonic research is that almost all large onshore exposures of oceanic lithosphere that escaped recycling into the Earth’s mantle by subduction—ophiolites—form when subduction zones initiated