Fifty Years of the Wilson Cycle Concept in Plate Tectonics (Geological Society of London Special Publications) (The Geological Society of London)

Fifty years ago, Tuzo Wilson published his paper asking; Did the Atlantic close and then re-open?. This led to the Wilson Cycle concept in which the repeated opening and closing of ocean basins along old orogenic belts is a key process in the assembly and breakup of supercontinents. The Wilson Cycle underlies much of what we know about the geological evolution of the Earth and its lithosphere, and will no doubt continue to be developed as we gain more understanding of the physical processes that control mantle convection, plate tectonics, and as more data become available from currently less accessible regions.