A tectonic plate that disappeared under North America millions of years ago still peeks out in central California and Mexico, new research finds. The Farallon oceanic plate was once nestled between ...

As the Pacific-Farallon spreading center approached North America, the Farallon plate fragmented into a number of small plates. Some of the microplate fragments ceased subducting before the spreading ...

The Isabella anomaly -- the seismic signal of a large mass of cool, dehydrated material about 100 kilometers beneath central California -- is in fact a surviving slab of the Farallon oceanic plate, ...

Researchers have discovered that the North American continent is slowly losing rock from its underside in a process called "cratonic dripping." This is caused by the remnants of the Farallon Plate, an ...

It’s long been held that North America’s rugged and mountainous west was formed by the movement of the undersea Farallon plate, and that the process was roughly similar to the way groceries pile up at ...

An ancient slab of Earth's crust buried deep beneath the Midwest is sucking huge swatches of present-day's North American crust down into the mantle, researchers say. The slab's pull has created giant ...

PROVIDENCE, R.I., March 18 (UPI) -- A geologic anomaly 60 miles under central California is a remnant of an ancient oceanic plate pushed under North America 100 million years ago, scientists say.

The mountain ranges of the North American Cordillera are made up of dozens of distinct crustal blocks. A new study clarifies their mode of origin and identifies a previously unknown oceanic plate that ...

Earthquakes and volcanism occur as a result of plate tectonics. The movement of tectonic plates themselves is largely driven by the process known as subduction. The question of how new active ...

An unprecedented observation of a major geological process is currently taking place off the North American coast. For the ...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — Large chunks of an ancient tectonic plate that slid under North America millions of years ago are still present under parts of central California and Mexico, ...