title: Mantle shear-wave velocity structure beneath the Hawaiian hot spot.
abstract: Defining the mantle structure that lies beneath hot spots is important for revealing their depth of origin. Three-dimensional images of shear-wave velocity beneath the Hawaiian Islands, obtained from a network of sea-floor and land seismometers, show an upper-mantle low-velocity anomaly that is elongated in the direction of the island chain and surrounded by a parabola-shaped high-velocity anomaly. Low velocities continue downward to the mantle transition zone between 410 and 660 kilometers depth, a result that is in agreement with prior observations of transition-zone thinning. The inclusion of SKS observations extends the resolution downward to a depth of 1500 kilometers and reveals a several-hundred-kilometer-wide region of low velocities beneath and southeast of Hawaii. These images suggest that the Hawaiian hot spot is the result of an upwelling high-temperature plume from the lower mantle.
authors: Hawaii Institute of Geophysics and Planetology, University of Hawaii at Manoa, Honolulu, HI 96822, USA. cecily@soest.hawaii.edu
authors: Cecily J
authors: CJ
authors: Wolfe
authors: Sean C
authors: SC
authors: Solomon
authors: Gabi
authors: G
authors: Laske
authors: John A
authors: JA
authors: Collins
authors: Robert S
authors: RS
authors: Detrick
authors: John A
authors: JA
authors: Orcutt
authors: David
authors: D
authors: Bercovici
authors: Erik H
authors: EH
authors: Hauri