Mantle Plumes And Their Record In Earth History

In recent years an enormous amount of data have been published related to mantle plumes, both modern and ancient. Some significant questions have arisen. Could the Earth have been more like Mars and Venus during the Archean? Instead of cooling principally by plate tectonics as it does today, did the Archean Earth cool chiefly by rising mantle plumes? How do we identify the effects of mantle plumes in the geologic record? Did plumes have a role in the growth of continents? Are large mantle plume events recorded in the geologic record, and, if so, what were the consequences of these events in terms of our atmosphere, oceans, and biosphere? Mantle Plumes and Their Record in Earth History provides a timely and comprehensive review of the origin and history of mantle plumes throughout geologic time. This book describes the new and exciting results of the last few years and integrates an immense amount of material from the fields of geology, geophysics, and geochemistry that bear on mantle plumes. Included are chapters on hotspots and mantle upwelling, large igneous provinces (including examples from Mars and Venus), mantle plume generation and melting in plumes, plumes as tracers of mantle processes, plumes and continental growth, Archean mantle plumes, superplumes, and mantle plume events in Earth history and their effect on the atmosphere, oceans, and life in the geologic past. This book will be valuable as a textbook for advanced undergraduate and graduate courses in geophysics, geochemistry, and geology and will also serve as a reference for researchers in the Earth sciences from a variety of disciplines.