The Emerald fracture zone is an undersea fracture zone running the distance from the southwest corner of the Campbell Plateau to the northern tip of Iselin Bank. The name was proposed by Dr. Steven C. Cande of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography for the vessel Emerald, which traversed this region in 1821, and was approved by the Advisory Committee for Undersea Features in June 1997. The Emerald Basin to its northwest was named from the same source. Some have restricted the name to the southern east west orientated transform fault zone but the north south orientated faults that define the eastern boundary of the Emerald Basin are generally included in the literature.