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Unit 3 Study Guide
Name:
Earth’s Composition, Plate Tectonics and Interactions, Volcanos, Earthquakes, Extinction
Earth’s Composition
1. What is the difference between chemical layers and mechanical layers?
2. List the chemical layers from closest to surface to closest to the middle and explain each one.
3. What caused the different chemical layers to separate into the way they are now?
4. List the mechanical layers from closest to surface to closest to the middle and explain each one.
5. What evidence (2 pieces of it) tells us that the core is made up of a liquid portion and a solid portion?
6. If we are talking about convection currents inside the earth, are we talking chemical or mechanical layers?
7. Draw me a convection current, and label it with the words: heat source, hottest, cooler, more dense, less dense.
8. What layers are involved in the whole convection current thing?
9. List, the very briefly explain, the 3 things that keep the Earth’s interior warm.
Plate Interactions
1. List the 3 major types of plate boundary interactions and explain each one with arrows.
2. List the 3 major types of converging boundaries, explain each with arrows, and describe what happens at each one.
3. Explain, with arrows and words, what a RIFT, RIDGE, TRENCH, and FAULT are.
4. Where and when is new crust made?
5. Where and when is crust destroyed?
6. Is oceanic crust or is continental crust older? Explain why.
Mid Atlantic Ridge (MAR)
1. What plate boundary interactions produced the Mid-Atlantic Ridge?
2. What is actually occurring at the MAR in terms of rocks?
3. As you get further and further away from the MAR, what happens to the age of the ocean rocks?
4. Say we used Potassium-40 with a half-life of 1,000 years and not 1.2 billion (easier math) to date the age rocks on the
Atlantic Ocean floor. How many grams of Potassim-40 will be left from a 80g sample after 3,000 years? (If you forgot
this, go watch the videos in Unit 1…)
Ttotal =
T½ =
Mstart =
Mend =
# ½ lives =
ANSWER ___________
5. What does the magnetic orientation of the rocks on the Atlantic Floor tell us about Earth?
Volcanos
1. What plate boundary interactions usually produce volcanoes?
2. What are the 3 major gasses expelled during a volcano?
3. Where are +70% of the Earth’s volcanoes found?
4. Hawaii is found in the middle of the ocean, away from any plate
boundaries. What is causing the Hawaiian Volcanoes?
5. The Hawaiian volcano mountain chain stretches northwest to the middle of the Pacific, while the Emperor mountain
chain stretches more towards the north off the end of the Hawaiian mountain chain. What does this information
specifically tell us?
6. Which portion of these sea-mountains are the youngest?
7. What does that age tell us about the size/height of the sea-mountains when comparing the oldest to the youngest
mountains?
Earthquakes
1. What plate boundary interactions usually produce earthquakes?
2. What is a fault?
3. How is the focus and the epicenter of an earthquake related?
4. When an earthquake occurs, P and S seismic waves are released.
Full Name?
Faster or slower?
P Wave
What can they travel through
S Wave
San Francisco, CA
Seattle, WA
Houston, TX
Time between P and S wave (min)
_____________
_____________
_____________
Distance from Epicenter (km)
_____________
_____________
_____________
5. What machine do we use to measure the magnitude of earthquakes?
6. What scale do we use to measure the magnitude of earthquakes, and what is the range of the scale?
7. As earthquakes get more damaging (higher magnitudes) what happens to the frequency at which we see earthquakes of
that strength (ie: how common is a 5 vs an 8)?
Plate Tectonics
1. For each of the following topics, explain how that topic is evidence that Earth’s crust is made of plates and these plates
are constantly moving.
a. Volcanoes
b. Ring of Fire
c.
Hawaii and Emperor Seamount Chains
d. Earthquakes
e. Fit of the continents
f.
Fossil Evidence across continents
g. Rock Type and Structural Similarities
h. Paleoclimatic Evidence
i.
Paleomagnetism:
2. How long ago did Pangaea start to break up?
3. Was Pangaea the only supercontinent in Earth’s
history?
4. Using the image, tell me if the following boundary
is CONVERGING/DIVERGING and if a
RIDGE/TRENCH will be forming there.
a. Right below Alaska’s Aleutian Island chain.
b. Between Greenland and Northern Europe
c.
Between Antarctic and Australia.
5. What type of boundary is between the Eurasian Plate and India (49 on the map)? What landform will this cause?
Dinosaurs and Extinctions
1. How long ago did the dinosaurs become extinct?
2. Did all life on earth die at that point?
3. What 3 factors certainly had an impact upon the extinction of the dinosaurs?
4. Was this the largest mass extinction in Earth’s history?
5. How many major mass extinctions have there been in Earth’s history (not including the current day one)?