title: The Emperor Seamounts: southward motion of the Hawaiian hotspot plume in Earth's mantle.
abstract: The Hawaiian-Emperor hotspot track has a prominent bend, which has served as the basis for the theory that the Hawaiian hotspot, fixed in the deep mantle, traced a change in plate motion. However, paleomagnetic and radiometric age data from samples recovered by ocean drilling define an age-progressive paleolatitude history, indicating that the Emperor Seamount trend was principally formed by the rapid motion (over 40 millimeters per year) of the Hawaiian hotspot plume during Late Cretaceous to early-Tertiary times (81 to 47 million years ago). Evidence for motion of the Hawaiian plume affects models of mantle convection and plate tectonics, changing our understanding of terrestrial dynamics.
authors.affiliation: Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY 14627, USA. john@earth.rochester.edu
authors.forename: John A
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Tarduno
authors.forename: Robert A
authors.initials: RA
authors.lastname: Duncan
authors.forename: David W
authors.initials: DW
authors.lastname: Scholl
authors.forename: Rory D
authors.initials: RD
authors.lastname: Cottrell
authors.forename: Bernhard
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Steinberger
authors.forename: Thorvaldur
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Thordarson
authors.forename: Bryan C
authors.initials: BC
authors.lastname: Kerr
authors.forename: Clive R
authors.initials: CR
authors.lastname: Neal
authors.forename: Fred A
authors.initials: FA
authors.lastname: Frey
authors.forename: Masayuki
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Torii
authors.forename: Claire
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Carvallo