What makes the Atlantic interesting?

[WeRtheOcean]

Since I plan to be buried at sea, I have been interested in benthic/abyssal geophysics and biota. I now live on the Atlantic Coast, which means that it is likely that I will end up being buried in the Atlantic Ocean. I have, therefore, been comparing the Atlantic with the Indo-Pacific. The Atlantic is a much younger ocean, and has not had as much time to develop geophysical and biotic features.

In the Indo-Pacific, we find the East Pacific Rise, Galapagos Rift, black and white smokers, and various subduction trenches because of the assemblage of tectonic plates, of which the Marianas Trench is only the deepest. The Clipperton Fracture Zone has become prominent recently in the controversy over ocean floor mining. There are whole archipelagoes of seamounts. Along the midocean ridge lives the famous Riftia polyptila tube worm, the Pompeii worm, and the clams and mussels with chemosynthetic bacterial symbionts (Calyptogena and Bathymodiolus)

The Atlantic is fundamentally different in that there is no Atlantic Plate. The only subduction trench I know of is at the Caribbean Plate boundary. Looking at a bathymetric map, I see a couple of seamount archipelagoes, one related to the New England Hotspot and what appers to be another near southern Africa. Black and white smokers have been found at the midocean ridge, and, after searching, I did find references to Calyptogena and Bathymodiolus in the Atlantic as well. Cold seeps and deep-water reefs, likewise, are found in both oceans.

Still, the Atlantic seems to be a less complex geophysical and biotic system than the Indo-Pacific, with fewer of the aforementioned features. Rosalind Bank appears to be the only true atoll in the Atlantic, and is completely submerged, in contrast to the numerous Indo-Pacific atolls and barrier reef islands like Bora Bora; likewise, the Puerto Rico Trench appears to be the only trench. I have found no references to Riftia polyptila or the Pompeii worm in the Atlantic, and sponge reefs are only known in the North Pacific. So it seems that the types of points of interest in the Atlantic are a subset of those in the Indo-Pacific.

Have I missed something? Are there features of the Atlantic that are unique, not shared with the Indo-Pacific? Or what makes the Atlantic an interesting basin to study?

 

[Sure Squintsalot]

Well, where to start!?
I'd consider the Atlantic's outsized role in human evolution and culture:

• The Gulf Stream's transport of a warm climate has largely made western civilization possible. That same current's submergence in the Arctic and transport to the Antarctic is the single largest heat, nutrient, and carbon conveyor on the planet.
• The science of plate tectonics would have occurred much less quickly without the determined search for submarines in ww2: magnetometers on Atlantic -crossing ships picked up seafloor magnetic stripes and their twins on the other side of the mid-ocean ridge. Don't forget the matching coasts and coastal fossils of Africa and South America.
• That Atlantic mid-ocean ridge, incidentally, is also the longest unbroken mountain chain in the solar system.

As for me, I'll be buried on land, right after having eaten a handful of raw pecans. A glorious pecan tree will sprout from my corpse and people can eat my nuts for generations.

 

[tarponchik]

Availability

 

[Green Frog]

You’re kidding, right? Black smokers and sea floor spreading as well as underwater volcanoes are just a few of the main geologic activities. Then there are coral reefs around islands in warmer latitudes. If I were considering burial at sea, I’d at least give some thought to the “Graveyard of the Atlantic” off of the Carolinas.
If you don’t find anything interesting about the Atlantic, either you have a very narrow definition of interesting or you just haven’t looked!

 

[agilis]

Believe me, you will not notice any difference when the time comes.

 

[tridacna]

Atlantic by Simon Winchester. Should be required reading by @WeRtheOcean

Brilliant book by a brilliant author.

 

[WeRtheOcean]

If you don’t find anything interesting about the Atlantic

The question was more specific: "Are there features of the Atlantic that are unique, not shared with the Indo-Pacific?"

 

[tursiops]

The question was more specific: "Are there features of the Atlantic that are unique, not shared with the Indo-Pacific?"

The circulation of the water in the two systems is quite different. The IndoPacific is mostly two dimensional, like a giant fjord, and is rather boring, whereas the Atlantic is fundamentally three dimensional, with the colder waters sinking in the north and slowly diffusion upwards in the southern regions. You seem quite focused on the geology of the two oceans, which really misses the point.

 

[MidOH]

Doesn't matter. The currents will get you to the pacific anyways. Eventually.

 

[tursiops]

Doesn't matter. The currents will get you to the pacific anyways. Eventually.

Maybe.