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oceanic ridge, any of several continuous submarine mountain chains rising from the ocean floor. Individually, oceanic ridges are the largest features in ocean basins. Collectively, they form the oceanic ridge system, which extends approximately 80,000 km (50,000 miles) through all the world’s oceans and thus constitutes the most prominent feature on Earth’s surface after the continents and the ocean basins themselves. In the past the ridges were referred to as mid-ocean ridges, but, as will...