The Manus Plate is a 100-km microplate located northeast of
New Guinea
New Guinea (; Hiri Motu: ''Niu Gini''; id, Papua, or , historically ) is the world's second-largest island with an area of . Located in Oceania in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, the island is separated from Australia by the wide Torr ...
. The Manus Plate was formed in between the
North Bismark Plate and the
South Bismark Plate. The Manus Plate currently rotates counter-clockwise in the Melanesia area.
Formation
The Manus Plate formed during the
Brunhes-Matuyama reversal, making its maximum age approximately 781,000 years old.
The Manus Plate formed in-between and on top of the
transform boundaries that were separating the North and South Bismark plates.
The plate was formed of young mid-ocean ridge basalt, along with pieces of older oceanic floor that had broken off of the South Bismarck plate.
Boundaries and Movement
The north and northeast boundaries of the Manus Plate, with the North Bismark and Pacific plates are both
convergent boundaries
A convergent boundary (also known as a destructive boundary) is an area on Earth where two or more lithospheric plates collide. One plate eventually slides beneath the other, a process known as subduction. The subduction zone can be defined by a ...
.
The plates southeast borders of the South Bismark plate is a
divergent boundary.
The southwest boundary bordering the South Bismark plate is a
transform boundary
A transform fault or transform boundary, is a fault along a plate boundary where the motion is predominantly horizontal. It ends abruptly where it connects to another plate boundary, either another transform, a spreading ridge, or a subductio ...
. The Manus plate currently has a rate of rotation of 51°/ Ma at the spot, -3.04°N, 150.46°E, in the counter-clockwise direction, due to the plates left lateral motion.
This is likely the fastest plate rotation, on Earth at this time.
References
Tectonic plates
Geology of the Pacific Ocean
{{tectonics-stub