New study explains previous observations of ocean water
flowing through the seafloor from one seamount to another
(June 26, 2015) Vast
quantities of ocean water circulate through the seafloor, flowing through the
volcanic rock of the upper oceanic crust. A new study by scientists at UC Santa
Cruz, published June 26 in Nature Communications, explains what drives this
global process and how the flow is sustained.
About 25 percent of the heat that flows out of the Earth's
interior is transferred to the oceans through this process, according to Andrew
Fisher, professor of Earth and planetary sciences at UC Santa Cruz and coauthor
of the study. Much of the fluid flow and heat transfer occurs through thousands
of extinct underwater volcanoes (called seamounts) and other locations where
porous volcanic rock is exposed at the seafloor.