They are powered by mantle plumes—columns of hot, buoyant rock rising from deep within the Earth. These hotspot plumes are stationary; as tectonic plates move over these stationary plumes ...

The Earth's mantle might not always ... found on Easter Island were evidence that the hotspot itself had been active for 165 million years. A diagram shows Easter Island's tectonic context.

The study examined hotspot lavas, which come from plumes that billow upward from Earth's deep mantle and erupt at volcanoes at the planet's surface. Samoa, Hawaii and Iceland are all hotspots.

You may be surprised to learn eastern Australia hosts the longest chain of continental hotspot volcanoes on Earth. These volcanoes erupted during the last 35 million years (for 1 to 7 million ...

Figure 1: Schematic diagram showing near-surface manifestations of a hotspot and shear sense from different polarities of basal traction. Figure 2: Inferred track of the Great Meteor hotspot.