Aden Ridge

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The Aden Ridge (also, Gulf of Aden Ridge) is a divergent tectonic plate boundary which runs offshore in the Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean along the southeastern coastline of the Arabian Peninsula. It extends eastward from the Afar Triple Junction to a junction with the Owen Fracture Zone, and separates the Arabian Plate from the Somalian subplate of the African Plate. The eastern segments of the Aden Ridge are also called the Sheba Ridge.

The area in which the three plates (African, Arabian, and Indo-Australian) come together is often referred to as the Aden-Owen-Carlsberg Triple Junction, although, unlike other triple junctions, the actual intersection of the three plate boundaries occurs where the Sheba segment of the Aden Ridge meets the Owen Fracture Zone, a point which is offset by the transform section of the Owen Fracture Zone from the northern end of the Carlsberg Ridge.

[edit] References

• "Long-term elasticity in the continental lithosphere; modelling the Aden Ridge propagation and the Anatolian extrusion process", Hubert-Ferrari et al, Geophysical Journal International, Volume 153, Issue 1, pp. 111-132