Anatomy of mid-Ocean ridges - Week 9

This week we learned about mid-Ocean ridges. I went to a location on google earth where there is a divergent boundary and I drew a line to get the elevation profile to gain a better understanding.

Here in this picture you can see the location where I drew the line to see the elevation profile of the sea floor.

We have learned that the faster the spreading is the smoother the ridge, or swell will be. The tallest elevation will be at the center and then it will smooth out the older it gets. This happens because the rocks are still heated and as they cool down they become smaller. When the spreading rate is slower there will be a rift valley and it will not be as smooth. 

  

Here we can see the elevation profile. I thought it would have been a lot smoother than it shows. On the right hand side we can see that it is pretty smooth - leading us to think this is a fast spreading sea floor. However, on the left hand side of the slope we see that it is a little more rugged, which may just mean there are a few small volcanoes under ground. In general we can see that this is a fast spreading sea floor. After a deeper look I saw something different.

Here we can see what should be expected at a fast spreading sea floor. 

We can draw the conclusion from the sea floor evidence that this is indeed a fast spreading sea floor.