A research team led by scientists from Utrecht University in the Netherlands has uncovered a 157-million-year-old submerged continent and reconstructed its history, which will contribute to a more easily understanding of the Earth's ecosystem and climate.
According to the study, published by the team in the journal Gondwana Research, the continent was about the size of the United States, about 3,<> kilometers wide.
The continent is believed to have separated from Australia during the Jurassic Period, the second of the three epochs of the Age of the Age that spanned from 201 to 145 million years ago. Over the millennia, the continent drifted toward Southeast Asia before eventually disappearing. This is captured by the researchers in the following video.
Argo abyssal plain
For decades, researchers suspected the existence of this continent because of a clear geological vacuum left behind, known as the "Argo abyssal plain", from which the discovered continent got its name "Argoland".
The Argo Abyssal Plain is a large basin in the Indian Ocean located between the northwest coast of Australia and the islands of Southeast Asia, with a maximum depth of 5730,<> metres.
The problem long faced by scientists researching Argoland was that most of the continent's body had eroded over time or disappeared completely into the mantle, but the Dutch team was able to find some of its traces by tracking the magnetic anomalies that characterize this region and indicate the age and direction of the rocky seabed spread.
A group of parts of this lost continent was found in the form of huge tectonic units scattered on the ocean floor and buried within small islands, and in particular the remaining pieces of the continent were hidden under the green forests of large parts of Indonesia and Myanmar.
This research team succeeded in rebuilding the body of the continent from the pieces they found (Utrecht University)
Scientific and economic benefits
According to the new study, Argoland appears to have split into an archipelago during the Late Triassic period, which lies just before the Jurassic period.
In addition, this research team succeeded in rebuilding the continent's body from the pieces they found, which, according to an official press release from Utrecht University, is necessary to understand the processes of evolution of biodiversity and climate over time on the surface of the globe, as well as to understand how mountains form and the driving forces behind plate tectonics that represent the Earth's lithosphere.
In addition, such reconstruction is particularly important in the economic context of finding raw materials, then extracting them and using them in industry.