Heat flow measurements have been employed to map variations in lithospheric thickness.
The regional subsidence in the Danish and North German basins may have been caused by lithospheric cooling.
Chains of oceanic volcanoes occur when lithospheric plates drift over a" hotspot".
Sea-floor spreading and continental drift were seen as involving these lithospheric plates rather than just oceanic or continental crust.
The evidence, including that of xenoliths carried in the magmas, supports the idea of melting of old metasomatized lithospheric mantle, usually associated with rifting tectonics.
An important consequence of this 'magmatic under plating' is that it reduces the density of the lithospheric column in which it is emplaced.
An additional influence of lithospheric flexural stress caused by intrusive and volcanic loading cannot be ruled out, however.
The second model involves derivation of the melts from a depleted lithospheric mantle source which was contaminated by subduction components.
