Maria Seton – The Conversation

Sunset over Mt Lidgbird and Mt Gower at Lord Howe Island. Dylan Shaw/Unspash

September 18, 2026

We found the hidden force that created two chains of underwater volcanoes running side by side

Ben Mather, The University of Melbourne and Maria Seton, University of Sydney

A new study unearths the deep Earth connection between Lord Howe Island and its sibling chain of drowned volcanoes.

Luisa Denu / Unsplash

December 18, 2020

Eastern Australia has hundreds of enigmatic volcanoes. New research shows how they formed

Ben Mather, University of Sydney; Dietmar Müller, University of Sydney; Jo Condon, The University of Melbourne; Maria Seton, University of Sydney, and Oliver Nebel, Monash University

From far north Queensland to the southern tip of Tasmania, there is a common geological mechanism that links Eastern Australia’s volcanic history.

Lord Howe Island is one of the few places where the lost continent of Zealandia is exposed above sea level. SHUTTERSTOCK

November 24, 2019

What are lost continents, and why are we discovering so many?

Maria Seton, University of Sydney; Joanne Whittaker, University of Tasmania, and Simon Williams, University of Sydney

We undertook a 28-day voyage to explore a possible lost continent in a remote part of the Coral Sea, in an area off the coast of Queensland. Here’s what we found.

Photographed on Kangaroo Island, this rock – called a ‘zebra schist’ – deformed from flat-lying marine sediments through being stressed by a continental collision over 500 million years ago. Dietmar Muller

May 8, 2019

How Earth’s continents became twisted and contorted over millions of years

Dietmar Müller, University of Sydney; Maria Seton, University of Sydney, and Sabin Zahirovic, University of Sydney

Giant forces slowly move continents across a viscous layer of the Earth, like biscuits gliding over a warm toffee ocean. This stresses the continents, and twists and contorts the crust.

Lord Howe Island is part of a volcanic seamount formed around 7 million years ago. Flickr/Roderick Eime

January 31, 2019

How we traced the underwater volcanic ancestry of Lord Howe Island

Maria Seton, University of Sydney; Nicholas Mortimer, GNS Science, and Simon Williams, University of Sydney

Lord Howe Island is part of an underwater volcanic chain much older than first thought, with the possibility of new islands still to form.

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