Asthenosphere

asthenosphere Image credit: Massey University The uppermost layer of the mantle of a rocky planet, located below the lithosphere. On Earth, this zone of soft, easily deformed rock lies at depths of about 100 to 250 km.

The asthenosphere is solid even though it is at very hot temperatures of about 1600 C due to the high pressures from above.

asthenosphere Layer of Earth's interior just below the lithosphere over which the surface plates slide. astrobiology ...

ASTHENOSPHERE The asthenosphere is a part of the upper mantle that exhibits plastic (flowing) properties. It is located below the lithosphere (the crust and rigid upper mantle), between about 100 and 250 kilometers deep.

When oceanic crust runs into oceanic crust or into continental crust, the denser lithosphere material slides under the less dense lithosphere material and melts in the asthenosphere.

The part of the mantle near the crust, about 50-100 km down, is especially soft and plastic, and is called the asthenosphere. The mantle and crust above are cool enough to be tough and elastic, and are known as the lithosphere.

The lithosphere essentially floats on the asthenosphere and is broken up into what are called tectonic plates.

The upper mantle is separated from the crust above by a seismic discontinuity, called the Moho, and from the lower mantle below by a zone of weakness known as the asthenosphere.

The theory of plate tectonics states that the lithosphere is divided into plates which interact with each other and float around the planed on the asthenosphere.

These and other minerals are refractory and crystalline at high temperatures; therefore, most settle out of rising magma, either forming new crustal material or never leaving the mantle. Part of the upper mantle called the asthenosphere might be ...

The denser lithospheric plates (60 kilometres thick beneath the oceans and ranging from about 100-200 kilometres beneath the continents) ride on a weak, perhaps partially molten, layer of the upper mantle called the asthenosphere.

plates (tectonics) (NASA Thesaurus) Rigid divisions of the outer surface of the Earth (lithosphere) which moves over a weaker layer (asthenosphere).

See also: Earth, Lithosphere, Crust, Ocean, Planet