A Jamming–Unjamming Mechanism for Rapid Continental Break-up

OVERVIEWThis white paper proposes and stress-tests a falsifiable mechanism for a rapidphase of continental break-up, using the opening of the Atlantic as its workedtest case. The central claim is that break-up need not proceed only throughslow, steady mid-ocean-ridge spreading: under the right initial conditions ashort, dynamically distinct episode of fast sliding can occur. The mechanism isformalized as an explicit causal chain — antipodal tensile rupture → opening ofa pressure-deficit void → suction (a net pull on the trailing plate) → frictioncollapse by unjamming and liquefaction → runaway sliding — with each link fixedin explicit notation so it can be checked rather than merely asserted. MECHANISMA trigger on the Pacific side (uplift) produces an antipodal tensile rupturethat propagates as a "zipper," opening a void whose internal pressure fallsbelow lithostatic. The resulting suction supplies the driving term. Resistanceis removed not by melting but by an unjamming–liquefaction transition at thesliding interface: the paper confronts the standard objection that a thin waterlayer under continent-scale normal stress would simply squeeze out sideways,and argues the effective basal friction can nonetheless collapse toμ_eff ≈ 2.2×10⁻³ with no melt required (Ψ_eff > Ψ_y at the interface).Stabilization is asymmetric — Pacific-side sloshing versus Atlantic-sidefilling — which bounds the duration of the episode. First-pass scale checks(force, friction, time, impulse) under explicit Omega-NoGo constraints, plus afull energy and dissipation budget, are carried out as necessary conditions ontop of the causal chain. METHOD: PRE-REGISTRATION AND GATESRather than fitting after the fact, the work is organized around 35pre-registered predictions (P1–P35), each carrying an explicit PASS / HOLD /FAIL gate so the outcome is decided by stated criteria. A PASS-locked coreisolates the subset of links treated as load-bearing evidence; the remainderare registered as assumptions, hypotheses, or variants with declaredreadiness. Four predictions resolve as bounded HOLDs, and these are not hidden —an explicit HOLD roadmap states what evidence would move them. A deliberatechronology firewall concedes the U–Pb break-up ages outright and keeps thedynamical mechanism chronology-agnostic, so the physical claim stands or fallsindependently of any disputed absolute timeline (including the magnetic-stripingquestion handled under P8). SCOPE AND STRUCTURE33 chapters move from a one-page overview and scope statement through aglossary, the register system, the PASS-locked causal core, an evidencedossier, and a complete reproducibility/file map, into the Atlantic-opening"engine" (trigger, rupture propagation, spatiotemporal mapping, driving term,resistance collapse, stabilization, scale and energy checks), the full slate ofpre-registered predictions including resource cross-evidence (P31–P35), and acandid alternatives-and-limitations section that situates the mechanism againststandard long-term ridge spreading and competing short-term triggers.Appendices supply internal references (IR-1–IR-7), a VP-frame mapping with anoptional 4.3 ka coupling, the ATL DataPack schema, the pre-registrationskeletons, and the data-source registry. Approx. 28,390 words, 1,157 equations,28 tables. REPRODUCIBILITY AND PROVENANCEThe deposited archive is a fully deterministic build (VP-SPEC v1.8); itsvalidation suite reproduces 39/39 checks. Single-author work by Young Jae Lee(ORCID 0009-0002-7535-8245), released under CC BY 4.0.Repository: https://github.com/rego093-sketch/jamming-physicsSite: https://jamming-physics.org