HOW WIDE IS THE OCEAN?

If it’s the Atlantic, it’s getting wider all the time.

Ageological phenomenon is pushing North and South America further away from Europe and Africa, widening the Atlantic up to four centimetres a year.

A team of seismologists, led by the University of Southampton, UK, suggests an upwelling in the mantle – the material composed mostly of silicates between the Earth’s crust and its core – from depths of more than 600 kilometres may be the reason why plates attached to the Americas are moving apart from plates attached to Europe and Africa.

“This work is exciting, and refutes long-held assumptions that mid-ocean ridges might play a passive role in plate tectonics,” says Mike Kendall from the University of Oxford. “It suggests that in places such as the mid-atlantic forces at the ridge play an important role in driving newly formed plates apart.”

The findings, published in

Nature, could help scientists develop better models and warning systems for natural disasters.