The Mid-Ocean Ridge

Move over, Andes and Himalayas. The planet’s longest mountain range is under the waves!

Made up of 40,000 continuous miles (65,000 km) of underwater volcanoes, the Mid-Ocean Ridge encircles the globe like stitches on a baseball.

Most of Earth’s volcanic activity takes place along this deep-sea range. As tectonic plates pull apart, magma rises to form new crust—sometimes explosively.

It’s also a hotspot for deep-sea life: hydrothermal vent ecosystems that offer clues to the origins of life on Earth.

(Map by Natalie Renier, WHOI Creative)

SOURCES
Global ocean bathymetry and land topography at 15 arc-second resolution. Generated by the General Bathymetric Chart of the Oceans (GEBCO) project; https://doi.org/10.5285/36c8e7a7-1a12-4d3d-9a75-97e7e2d15b0e.

Global tectonic plate boundaries and geologic province polygons defining continental, oceanic, and orogenic domains. Generated using the revised New Maps of Global Geologic Provinces and Tectonic Plates dataset by Hasterok et al. (Earth Science Reviews, in revision).

Global compilation of active and inferred submarine hydrothermal vent fields (point features) containing vent location, depth, tectonic setting, temperature class, and related metadata. Generated from Beaulieu, S.E. & Szafrański, K.M. (2020). InterRidge Global Database of Active Submarine Hydrothermal Vent Fields, Version 3.4 [dataset]. PANGAEA. https://doi.org/10.1594/PANGAEA.917894.