There is a Misplaced Continent Hiding Beneath Southeast Asia

There’s a misplaced continent that could be hiding proper beneath our toes. 

Researchers from Utrecht College discovered that fragments of a landmass known as Argoland that cut up from the supercontinent Gondwana could also be hiding beneath the area the place Southeast Asia is situated at this time.

Gondwana, which was comprised of South America, Africa, India, Antarctica, and Australia, began to disintegrate through the early Jurassic interval round 180 million years in the past. Argoland was additionally a part of Gondwana that cut up from Australia round 150 million years in the past, however merely vanished since.

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However a workforce composed of researchers from UU’s Division of Earth Sciences and Division of Bodily Geography discovered that fragmented stays of the continent have been situated in Southeast Asia. The workforce used geological information gathered from the deep ocean basin generally known as Argo Abyssal Plain, situated off the western coast of Australia. 

Photograph by Gondwana Analysis / Utrecht College.

“The construction of the seafloor reveals that this continent will need to have drifted off to the northwest and will need to have ended up the place the islands of Southeast Asia are situated at this time,” a launch concerning the report stated. 

“The scenario in Southeast Asia may be very completely different from locations like Africa and South America, the place a continent broke neatly into two items. Argoland splintered into many alternative shards. That obstructed our view of the continent’s journey,” stated Eldert Advokaat, one of many authors. 

The authors centered their seek for the elusive Argoland “in a area from the jap Himalaya within the west to the Panthalassa Ocean-derived geological data of the Philippines, Halmahera, and New Guinea within the east.”

In line with the report, Argoland nonetheless exists in fragments, and proof of this may be discovered beneath the jungles that cowl areas in indonesia and Myanmar.

Photograph by Gondwana Analysis / Utrecht College.

“Intriguingly, in SE Asia there are not any intact relics of a significant continent comparable to India, however as an alternative the area shows an intensely deformed, long-lived accretionary orogen that shaped throughout greater than 100 million years of oceanic and continental subduction,” the examine’s summary stated. “Inside this orogen, there are continental fragments which will characterize components of Argoland.”

An orogen is a belt of the earth’s crust that’s concerned within the formation of mountains. 

“We recognized the Gondwana-derived blocks and mega-units of SW Borneo, Better Paternoster, East Java, South Sulawesi, West Burma, and Mount Victoria Land as fragments that collectively might characterize fragments of Argoland,” the summary added.

 The examine was first printed in Gondwana Analysis.