The interiors of rocky planets and moons tend to be pretty hot compared with their surfaces. This heat, which can be caused by a number of sources — such as tidal stretching and compression, the ...

Scientists have discovered a new layer of partly molten rock under the Earth's crust that might help settle a long-standing debate about how tectonic plates move. The molten layer is located about 100 ...

HOUSTON -- (May 29, 2018) -- New simulations of Earth's asthenosphere find that convective cycling and pressure-driven flow can sometimes cause the planet's most fluid layer of mantle to move even ...

These huge plates may move slowly, but they create many of the Earth’s unique topographical features such as mountains, chasms, individual islands, archipelagoes and ocean trenches – all on a ...

Seismic waves from earthquakes have always offered a window into Earth’s hidden interior. For decades, researchers believed they had a firm grasp on how these waves revealed the rocky mantle’s secrets ...

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Seismic data from marsquakes provide insight into the Red Planet's interior. NASA/JPL/Malin Space Science Systems Earthquakes can occur when our planet’s tectonic plates grind past each other. Mars ...

For millions of years, Earth’s shifting plates have shaped continents, formed oceans, and built towering mountain ranges. But ...

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Do tectonic plates move because of motion in the Earth's mantle, or is the mantle driven by the plates' movement? Or could it be that this question is ill-posed? This is the point of view adopted by ...

Scientists have discovered a new layer of partly molten rock under the Earth’s crust that might help settle a long-standing debate about how tectonic plates move. Researchers had previously identified ...