The incredible 'Atlas of the Underworld' Reveals 94 Ancient Tectonic Plates Lurking Deep Within Earth

Scientists have created an ‘Atlas of the Underworld,’ compiling the remnants of 94 ancient tectonic plates that now lie deep beneath Earth’s surface.

The atlas spans roughly 300 million years of Earth’s history, revealing how different geological processes changed the face of our planet.

Some of these slabs have sunk more than a thousand miles into the mantle, according to the researchers, giving rise to some of Earth’s most extraordinary features, from the Himalayas to the Pacific ‘Ring of Fire.’

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Scientists have created an ‘Atlas of the Underworld,’ compiling 94 slabs of ancient tectonic plates that now lie deep beneath Earth’s surface. The atlas spans roughly 300 million years of Earth’s history. The image above show the Cocos

The incredible catalogue of the ‘underworld’ is 17 years in the making, according to Ars Technica.

Dutch scientists Douwe van der Meer, Douwe van Hinsbergen, and Wim Spakman of Utrecht University published their work in the journal Tectonophysics this month, interpreting 94 distinct slabs.

And, they’ve already identified two more.

The ‘slabs’ represent ancient tectonic plates that have sunk below the surface.

With recent seismic tomography techniques, researchers are now able to create 3D images of the hidden processes at work deep underground, revealing slabs as far as 2,900 kilometers (1801 miles) deep.

‘At subduction zone plate boundaries, one plate disappears below another and sinks into the mantle,’ the authors explain on the website dedicated to their work.

‘These sinking plates, called “slabs,” are colder than their surroundings, and remain colder for a very long period of time – about 250 million years.

‘As a result, the speed at which seismic waves travel through these bodies of sinking lithosphere is a little higher than from the surrounding hot mantle.’

Once these plates have descended to the mantle, they can remain there millions of years.

But, they do not stop moving.

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