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Shaded relief
image of the fast-spreading East Pacific Rise at 12°35’
to 13° N enlarged from the northern part of the image
above. The 12°37’ N overlapping spreading center
is in the foreground; the 12°54’ N overlapping
spreading center is in the background. These discontinuities
offset the ridge axis only 1 to 2 kilometers and define
a fundamental segmentation of the spreading center that
went unrecognized until multibeam echo sounders were available.
The axial summit trough is large enough here (some 500
meters wide by 50 meters deep) to show up as a small axis
parallel groove along the crest of the East Pacific Rise.[back]
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