Oceanic intraplate volcanic islands and seamounts in the Canary Current Large Marine Ecosystem

Abstract

The Canary Islands and the Cape Verde Islands Volcanic Provinces show sets of islands and seamounts related to magma-driven processes over tens of millions of years at the Canary and Cape Verde hotspots. Continuous volcanism has been reported for the last 142 Ma on the Canaries and the last 26 Ma on the Cape Verde islands to these days. The oldest ones constitute volcanic edifices formed in tens of million years, whereas the youngest ones were formed within the last hundreds of thousand years up to a few million years. Indeed, these edifices have experienced different stages from submarine-subaerial volcanic to submarine inactive post-stages, which formed volcanic materials with varied compositions, sedimentary rocks and bioclast-rich, non-consolidated marine sediments. Islands and seamounts appear with complex or simple morphologies, dome-shaped to irregular relieves, and total heights ranging 4000-8000 m from the bottom to the island highest peaks, but less than 3500 m on seamounts. A set of several deep-water ecosystems is enhanced in both flora and fauna, known as traditional fishing areas expected to become protected under preservation plans, and potential mineral resources need to be further investigated. The LIFE+ INDEMARES project has provided new geological data from three Canary seamounts.