20 million years of 'hot spot' magmatism discovered under Cocos Plate.
Scientists have discovered a long-lived channel of magma beneath the Cocos Plate, which has been feeding intraplate magmatism for at least 20 million years. The channel is believed to have originated from the Galápagos Plume, over 1,000 kilometers away, and is a widespread and long-lived feature that could be a source for mantle metasomatism. The discovery was made by combining geophysical, geochemical, and seafloor drilling results with seismic reflection data, and could lead to similar discoveries of volcanism elsewhere caused by other mantle plumes.