In the Footsteps of Warren B. Hamilton: New Ideas in Earth Science

This unusual book, published to honor the late iconoclast and geologist extraordinaire Warren Bell Hamilton, comprises a diverse, cross-disciplinary collection of bold new ideas in Earth and planetary science. Some chapters audaciously point out all-too-obvious deficits in prevailing theories. Other ideas are embryonic and in need of testing and still others are downright outrageous. Some are doubtless right and others likely wrong. See if you can tell which is which. See if your students can tell which is which. This unique book is a rich resource for researchers at all levels looking for interesting, unusual, and off-beat ideas to investigate or set as student projects.
Icelandia
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Published:May 03, 2022
ABSTRACT
We propose a new, sunken continent beneath the North Atlantic Ocean that we name Icelandia. It may comprise blocks of full-thickness continental lithosphere or extended, magma-inflated continental layers that form hybrid continental-oceanic lithosphere. It underlies the Greenland-Iceland-Faroe Ridge and the Jan Mayen microplate complex, covering an area of ~600,000 km2. It is contiguous with the Faroe Plateau and known parts of the submarine continental rifted margin offshore Britain. If these are included in a “Greater Icelandia,” the entire area is ~1,000,000 km2 in size. The existence of Icelandia needs to be tested. Candidate approaches include magnetotelluric surveying in Iceland; ultralong, full-crust-penetrating reflection profiling along the length of the Greenland-Iceland-Faroe Ridge; dating zircons collected in Iceland; deep drilling; and reappraisal of the geology of Iceland. Some of these methods could be applied to other candidate sunken continents that are common in the oceans.
- Atlantic Ocean
- continental crust
- continental drift
- continental lithosphere
- cratons
- crust
- Europe
- geophysical methods
- geophysical profiles
- geophysical surveys
- Iceland
- Iceland-Faeroe Ridge
- lithosphere
- magnetotelluric methods
- North Atlantic
- plate tectonics
- reflection methods
- seismic methods
- seismic profiles
- surveys
- Western Europe
- Icelandia