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Spreading change of Africa–South America plate: insights from space geodetic observations

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An Erratum to this article was published on 18 July 2008

Abstract

The results derived from geological data show that the half-spreading rate between the African and South American plates has remained relatively constant at 2 cm/year over the past 80 million years (Silver et al. in Science 279:60–63, 1998). In this paper, we have reestimated a new relative angular velocity of Africa–South America plates using the selected space geodetic station data through a new method. Our angular velocity estimates the spreading rates of Africa–South America plate over several years that are similar in azimuth but significantly slower in rate than the NUVEL-1A predictions averaged over the past 3 million years. The implied rates of deceleration coincide with longer-term trends over the past 35 million years and may reflect the effects of plate interaction and coupling of Africa–South America plates.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Space Geodesy Research Group, Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute, Daejeon, 305-348, South Korea

    Shuanggen Jin

  2. School of Surveying and Spatial Information Systems, The University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW, 2052, Australia

    Shuanggen Jin & J. Wang

Authors
  1. Shuanggen Jin
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  2. J. Wang
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Correspondence to Shuanggen Jin.

Additional information

An erratum to this article can be found at http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00531-008-0351-y

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Jin, S., Wang, J. Spreading change of Africa–South America plate: insights from space geodetic observations. Int J Earth Sci (Geol Rundsch) 97, 1293–1300 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00531-007-0220-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00531-007-0220-0

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