Topic
Hydrothermal Vents
Student Investigation: How Black Smoker Vent Chimneys Form
Near spreading centers or subduction zones cold seawater percolates down through fissures in the ocean crust, is heated by hot magma, and reemerges, forming hydrothermal vents. At some vents known as black smokers, rocky chimneys can rise more than 50 meters from the sea floor. In this investigation, students explore how a solid forms from the mixing of two liquids and use the science ideas they develop to explain the phenomenon: How do chimneys form at black smoker hydrothermal vents?