Description: Petroleum systems located at passive continental margins received increasing attention in the last decade mainly because of deep- and ultra‐deep-water hydrocarbon exploration and production. The high risks associated with these settings originate mainly from the poor understanding of inherent geodynamic processes. The new priority program SAMPLE (South Atlantic Margin Processes and Links with onshore Evolution), established by the German Science Foundation in 2009 for a total duration of 6 years, addresses a number of open questions related to continental breakup and post‐breakup evolution of passive continental margins. 27 sub‐projects take advantage of the exceptional conditions of the South Atlantic as a prime “Geo‐archive.” The regional focus is set on the conjugate margins located east of Brazil and Argentina on one side and west of Angola, Namibia and South Africa on the other (Figure 1) as well as on the Walvis Ridge and the present‐day hotspot of Tristan da Cunha. The economic relevance of the program is demonstrated by support from several petroleum companies, but the main goal is research on fundamental processes behind the evolution of passive continental margins.

Description: Lithospheric plates move over the low‐viscosity asthenosphere balancing several forces, which generate plate motions. We use a global 3‐D lithosphere‐asthenosphere model (SLIM3D) with visco‐elasto‐plastic rheology coupled to a spectral model of mantle flow at 300 km depth to quantify the influence of intra‐plate friction and asthenospheric viscosity on plate velocities. We account for the brittle‐ductile deformation at plate boundaries (yield stress) using a plate boundary friction coefficient to predict the present‐day plate motion and net rotation of the lithospheric plates. Previous modeling studies have suggested that small friction coefficients ( urn:x-wiley:15252027:media:ggge21498:ggge21498-math-0001, yield stress urn:x-wiley:15252027:media:ggge21498:ggge21498-math-0002 MPa) can lead to plate tectonics in models of mantle convection. Here we show that in order to match the observed present‐day plate motion and net rotation, the frictional parameter must be less than 0.05. We obtain a good fit with the magnitude and orientation of the observed plate velocities (NUVEL‐1A) in a no‐net‐rotation (NNR) reference frame with urn:x-wiley:15252027:media:ggge21498:ggge21498-math-0003 and a minimum asthenosphere viscosity of urn:x-wiley:15252027:media:ggge21498:ggge21498-math-0004 Pas to 1020 Pas. Our estimates of net rotation (NR) of the lithosphere suggest that amplitudes urn:x-wiley:15252027:media:ggge21498:ggge21498-math-0005 ( urn:x-wiley:15252027:media:ggge21498:ggge21498-math-0006/Ma), similar to most observation‐based estimates, can be obtained with asthenosphere viscosity cutoff values of urn:x-wiley:15252027:media:ggge21498:ggge21498-math-0007 Pas to urn:x-wiley:15252027:media:ggge21498:ggge21498-math-0008 Pas and friction coefficients urn:x-wiley:15252027:media:ggge21498:ggge21498-math-0009.