Geophysical study of a seamount located on the continental margin of India

Abstract

Bathymetric, magnetic, and gravity data obtained over a 2,464 m high seamount located in the Arabian Sea indicate that the seamount (inferred mean density = 2.65 gm/cc) extends for 1 km beneath the seafloor and is locally isostatically compensated. With a reversely magnetized upper part and normally magnetized base, the seamount was probably formEd. by at least two volcanic episodes. The base was formed during the Late Paleocene (ca. 58 Ma) while the Indian Plate was moving over the Reunion hotspot. A renewed period of volcanism, contemporaneous with the major changes in direction of Indian Plate motion during the early Oligocene (ca. 36 Ma) probably formed the cap.