3. Hotspots2

A hot spot is a very hot region deep within the Earth. It is usually responsible for volcanic activity. They may be unanimously hot, and provide a great deal of molten magma. Hot spots do not always create volcanoes that spew rivers of lava. Sometimes, the magma heats up groundwater under the Earth’s surface, which causes water and steam to erupt like a volcano. These eruptions are called geysers.

There are 40 to 50 hot spots around the world, including near the Galapagos Islands (Ecuador) and Iceland. Hot spots can create entire chains of islands, like the U.S. state of Hawaii. Hawaii is on the Pacific plate, an enormous section of the Earth in the Pacific Ocean that is constantly moving, but very, very slowly. Although the plate is always moving, the hot spot underneath it stays still. The hot spot spewed magma that eventually became a chain of islands that rose over the surface of the water. These islands were created one right after the other as the plate moved, almost like an island factory.

Scientists use hot spots to track the movement of the Earth’s plates.

2 Biodiversity hotspot, a region of significant biodiversity is different thing.