Hot Superblobs at Earth's Core Feed Rivers of Molten Rock

The searing-hot plumes, which feed volcanoes on the surface, are likely themselves fed by two "superblobs" beneath Africa and the Pacific Ocean, the researchers said. The new results may settle a long-standing debate about whether these molten jets of magma, called mantle plumes, trigger volcanic eruptions. For decades, scientists have debated the existence of mantle plumes, or hot columns of magma that rise in the Earth's mantle, the layer between the crust and the molten iron and nickel outer