位于日本列岛及其邻近地区之下的太平洋和菲律宾海板块正在消减。这两个板块的消减导致了上地幔的横向不均匀性,可能也导致了下地幔的横向不均匀性。自70年代中期以来,走时数据的反演模拟(现被称为地震层析成像技术)已从几个尺度详细揭示了这一地区上地幔的三维非均匀结构。高分辨率的地震层析成像技术以较为精细的尺度作出了下倾板块及其 The Pacific Ocean and the Philippine Sea plate under the Japanese archipelago and adjacent areas are declining. Subtraction of these two plates results in lateral inhomogeneity of the upper mantle and may also lead to lateral inhomogeneities in the lower mantle. Since the mid-1970s, inversion modeling of travel-time data (now known as seismic tomography) has revealed in detail several dimensions of the three-dimensional heterogeneity of the upper mantle in the region. High-resolution seismic tomography techniques make downscaled plates and their