JOIDES Resolution, the flagship of the Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP).
Research into deep-water volcanoes in the Pacific Ocean will lay the groundwork for scientists to map the Earth as it appeared millions of years ago. An international team of scientists, including Dr David Buchs from the Research School of Earth Sciences at The Australian National University, returned on Friday from a two-month expedition to the Louisville Seamount Trail, a chain of extinct, underwater volcanoes 1500 kilometres to the northeast of New Zealand. The expedition was part of the worldwide Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP). The research team drilled cores up to 522 metres deep into five underwater volcanoes, recovering more than 800 metres of volcanic and sedimentary rocks. Back on shore, scientists will use advanced techniques to analyse the material. The results are expected to help other scientists reconstruct the geography of the Earth as it was in ancient times. Dr Buchs said the volcanoes are thought to have been created up to 85 million years ago, as the Pacific oceanic plate passed over a 'hotspot'.
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