The glass-ceiling convective regime and the origin and diversity of coronae on Venus.

Authors

Madeleine C Kerr, Dave R Stegman, Suzanne E Smrekar, Andrea C Adams

Published in

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. Volume 122. Issue 38. Pages e2504491122. Sep 23, 2025. Epub Sep 16, 2025.

Abstract

Venus and Earth are rocky planets of roughly the same size and bulk density, yet their surface volcanic and tectonic features appear substantially different. On Venus, the coexistence of large volcanic highlands-interpreted as the surface expression of long-lived mantle plumes-alongside coronae, smaller features thought to be caused by transient thermal diapirs, remains enigmatic. Using two-dimensional numerical models of mantle convection with sharp and broad mineral phase transitions for pyrolite, we show that both scales of upwellings can be generated in a stagnant lid planet with an interior temperature 250 to 400 K warmer than Earth's. The smaller plumes originate from a ~600 km deep internal layer that exists as a consequence of the different sequence of mineral phase transitions that occur in warmer mantles less processed and differentiated by partial melting and volcanism. Future models that include melting will provide further tests of our hypothesis.

PMID:
40956894
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 17 Sep 2025.

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