Abstract
Seamounts and islands are quite common features of the deep-ocean basins, particularly the Pacific Basin. A conspicuous but relatively small number of these volcanoes are arranged in long linear chains. The vast majority, however, occur as isolated edifices. Recent work on a small number of these isolated volcanoes shows that many were formed at or very close to mid-ocean spreading axes but that others are significantly younger than the underlying oceanic crust. The authors focus attention on age relations along and among the linear island chains that occur in the Pacific Ocean. Plate rotation models are based on geometry of the volcanic chains and the rate of volcanic migration along the chains.