When the ocean plates sink deep enough, portions are melted by the intense heat generated within the mantle, turning the solid rock into molten magma.

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They are also trying to understand the role that deep seas trenches play in earthquakes - these cracks in the sea floor are formed at the boundary of two tectonic plates and some believe the push and pull taking place deep underwater could be the cause of major earthquakes, such as the 2011 quake that resulted in such devastation in Japan.

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But it was only three years ago that vents were first detected in the Cayman Trough, a deep trench formed by the boundary between two tectonic plates.

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On Earth, the continents lie on tectonic plates that move relative to each other, creating mountains and deep sea shelves.

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Arriving in meadows carpeted with white narcissi and deep blue gentians, the cowherds were greeted by a village band and plates of polenta.

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Eyjafjallajokull, in Iceland, which erupted in April, stopping commercial flights over the Atlantic and Europe for a week, is at a junction where the plates are growing and moving apart, as magma wells up from deep in the Earth.

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The picture Mariner 9 painted of modern Mars was of a static desert, with none of the jostling of tectonic plates that makes life interesting for geologists by throwing up island chains and mountain ranges, and opening deep basins for oceans to form in.

ECONOMIST: Martian chronicles