RUNAWAY SUBDUCTION AS THE DRIVING MECHANISM FOR THE GENESIS FLOOD
Click on any of the figures below to get a larger image.
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Figure 1 Deformation map for olivine with a 1 mm grain size. Shear strain rates
 (in s-1) are contoured over shear stresst normalized by shear modulus m and absolute temperature T normalized by temperature of melting Tm. (From Kirby, [8]) |
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Figure 2 Numerical calculation of viscous slab sinking into viscous medium with temperature and strain rate dependent rheology. Reference viscosity is 1020 Pa s at 1600 K and zero strain rate in the upper 400 km and increases linearly with depth between 400 and 700 km by a factor of 50. Strain rate threshold for power law creep is 3 x 10-13 s-1. Slab initially is 100 km wide and 400 km high. Snapshots are at (a) 0.002, (b) 6.3, (c)13.6, and (d) 20.1 x 106 yr. Stain rates never become large enough for power law creep to occur.
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(a)
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(b)
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(c)
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(d)
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Figure 3 Same as Figure 2 except strain rate threshold is 6.5 x 10-14 s-1. Snapshots are at (a) 0.001, (b) 6.2, (c) 13.4, (d) 18.9, (e) 22.6, and (f) 25.0 x 106 yr. Sinking plume runs away shortly after final snapshot.
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| (c) | (d) |
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| (e) | (f) |
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