The Magellan Seamounts (also known as Magellan Seamount Group[1] and previously called Magellan Rise[2][3] ) stretch from the Mariana Trench to Ita Mai Tai Guyot.[4] Geological studies have demonstrated unique features with implications on understanding of ocean island basalt volcanism.[5] Contracts exist with the International Seabed Authority to exploit the areas potential mineral wealth.[6]
The volcanoes are part of a hotspot chain whose formation ages are in the range 121 to 86 million years ago.[10][7][8][13] However recently sampling has shown secondary volcanic activity at about 20 million years ago.[10]Pako Guyot, which is quite large, is to date the only ocean island basalt seamount where two quite distinct mantle plume components have been discovered in one seamount, being an extreme high μ = 238U/204Pb mantle (HIMU) and enriched mantle 1 (EM1) component. These are respectively suggestive of associations with the Arago hotspot and/or the Rarotonga hotspot and make a previously suggested association with the Samoa hotspot less likely.[5]
Given their age the guyots have also had sedimentary deposits which have been characterised as reef and planktonic limestones.[14][15] They are of interest for their mineral potential, for example with cobalt containing ferromanganese nodule deposits.[6]
^Zakharov, Yu D.; Pletnev, S. P.; Mel’nikov, M. E.; Smyshlyaeva, O. P.; Khudik, V. D.; Evseev, G. A.; Punina, T. A.; Safronov, P. P.; Popov, A. M. (1 February 2007). "The first finds of cretaceous belemnites from the Magellan Rise, Pacific Ocean". Russian Journal of Pacific Geology. 1 (1): 30. Bibcode:2007RuJPG...1...29Z. doi:10.1134/S1819714007010058. ISSN1819-7140. S2CID129404630.
^Mel'nikov, M. E.; Pletnev, S. P.; Basov, I. A. (2006). "New Geological and Paleontological Data on Fedorov Guyot, Magellan Seamounts, Pacific". Tikhookean. Geol. (in Russian). 25 (1): 3–13.
^ abWei, Xun; Zhang, Yan; Shi, Xue-Fa; Castillo, Paterno R; Xu, Yi-Gang; Yan, Quan-Shu; Liu, Ji-Hua (2022). "Co-Occurrence of HIMU and EM1 Components in a Single Magellan Seamount: Implications for the Formation of West Pacific Seamount Province". Journal of Petrology. 63 (4). doi:10.1093/petrology/egac022.
^ abcdPeretyazhko, IS; Savina, EA (2022). "Cretaceous intraplate volcanism of Govorov Guyot and formation models of the Magellan seamounts Pacific Ocean". International Geology Review. 65 (16): 1–27. Bibcode:2023IGRv...65.2479P. doi:10.1080/00206814.2022.2145512.
^ ab"Pako Guyot". Seamount Catalog. Retrieved 5 Mar 2023.
^ abcPeretyazhko, I.S.; Savina, E.A.; Pulyaeva, I.A.; Yudin, D.S. (2023). "Intraplate Volcanism of the Alba Guyot: Geodynamic Formation Models of the Magellan Seamounts in the Pacific Ocean for 100 million years". Russian Geology Geophysics. 64 (1): 1–27. Bibcode:2023RuGG...64....1P. doi:10.2113/RGG20214422.