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Plate Tectonics
Sidney Swindell
C1
Inner Core
 Is a ball of hot, solid metals
 Enormous amounts of pressure in the
center of the earth
 one of the two cores
 This squeezes the atoms of the metal so
closely together that the core the core
remains solid
 This core is in the center of the earth.
Outer core
 The outer core of the Earth is a liquid layer about 2,266
kilometers thick composed of iron and nickel which lies above the
Earth's solid inner core and below its mantle.
 The temperature of the outer core ranges from 4400 °C in the
outer regions to 6100 °C near the inner core.
 Because of its high temperature, modeling work has shown that
the outer core is a low viscosity fluid (about ten times the viscosity
of liquid metals at the surface) that convects turbulently.
 [1] Eddy currents in the nickel iron fluid of the outer core are
believed to influence the Earth's magnetic field.
 The outer layer is mostly liquid.
Mantle
 The layer of the earth between earth’s outer core and crust
 The mantle is a part of a terrestrial planet or other rocky body
large enough to have chemically divided into layers. The mantle is
a highly viscous layer between the crust and the outer core.
Earth's mantle is a rocky shell about 2,900 km (1,800 mi) thick[1]
that constitutes about 84% of Earth's volume.[2] It is
predominantly solid and encloses the iron-rich hot core, which
occupies about 15% of Earth's volume.[2][3] Past episodes of
differentiation by density. The interior of the Earth, similar to the
other terrestrial planets, is melting and volcanism at the shallower
levels of the mantle have produced a thin crust of crystallized melt
products near the surface, upon which we live.
Crust
 The thin layer of rock above earth’s
surface
 All life in the universe that we know of,
occurs there.
 The crust is the coldest layer of all the
layers of Earth.
 The crust makes up less than 1% of the
Earth's mass.
Lithosphere
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The lithosphere is made up of the crust and uppermost brittle mantle.
The layer of earth made up of the crust and the ridged rock of the upper
mantle
The lithosphere is the solid, rocky layer covering the entire surface of the
planet, composed of the crust and the hard uppermost mantle,
and reacts
to stresses as a brittle solid.
The lithosphere ranges in thickness from 50 - 200 kmA and is
fragmented into tectonic plates with boundaries where plates collide,
diverge, or grind past each other.
Read more:
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_the_lithosphere#ixzz1l2vCXUiG
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Asthenosphere
 The layer of the earth’s upper mantle
directly under the lithosphere MARY
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Tectonic Plate
 One of the large moving pieces into
which earths lithosphere is broken and
which commonly carry both oceanic and
continental crust
 There are 14
 They are apart of the lithosphere
 They cause earthquakes
Continental Drift
 The hypothesis that earth’s continents move on earth’s
surface
 In 1915, the German geologist and meteorologist
Alfred Wegener first proposed the theory of continental
drift, which states that parts of the Earth's crust slowly
drift atop a liquid core.
 The fossil record supports and gives credence to the
theories of continental drift and plate tectonics.
 Wegener hypothesized that there was a gigantic
supercontinent 200 million years ago, which he named
Pangaea, meaning "All-earth".
Pangaea
 A hypothetical super continent that once included all of
the landmass
 The Pangaea theory is one that states that all present
continents were once together and collectively known
as a 'supercontinent' called a Pangaea.
 The word 'Pangaea' means 'all lands' in Greek,
accurately defining the way the continents were 200
millions years ago before it split up.
 These split-up pieces drifted slowly apart and became
the way they are today.
Convection Currents
 A circulation pattern in which material is heated and rises in one
area, then cools and sinks in another area
 The mantle is made of much denser, thicker material, because of this
the plates "float" on it like oil floats on water.
 Many geologists believe that the mantle "flows" because of
convection currents. Convection currents are caused by the very
hot material at the deepest part of the mantle rising, then cooling,
sinking again and then heating, rising and repeating the cycle over
and over.
 The next time you heat anything like soup or pudding in a pan you
can watch the convection currents move in the liquid. When the
convection currents flow in the mantle they also move the crust. The
crust gets a free ride with these currents
 . A conveyor belt in a factory moves boxess like the convection
currents in the mantle moves the plates of the Earth.
Divergent Boundary
 A boundary along which two tectonic plates
move apart
 A tectonic boundary where two plates are
moving away from each other and new crust is
forming from magma that rises to the Earth's
surface between the two plates
 . The middle of the Red Sea and the midocean ridge (running the length of the Atlantic
Ocean) are divergent plate boundaries.
 Also called passive margin, spreading zone
Convergent Boundary
 A boundary along which two tectonic plates push
together
 A tectonic boundary where two plates are moving
toward each other.
 If the two plates are of equal density, they usually
push up against each other, forming a mountain chain.
If they are of unequal density, one plate usually sinks
beneath the other in a subduction zone.
 The western coast of South America and the
Himalayan Mountains are convergent plate boundaries.
Also called active margin, collision zone
Transform Boundary
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A boundary along which tow tectonic plates scrape past each other
n plate tectonics, a transform boundary (also known as transform fault
boundary, transform plate boundary, transform plate margin, strikeslip boundary, sliding boundary, or conservative plate boundary) is
said to occur when tectonic plates slide and grind against each other
along a transform fault. The relative motion of such plates is horizontal in
either sinistral or dextral direction. Many transform boundaries are locked
in tension before suddenly releasing, and causing earthquakes.
Most transform boundaries are found on the ocean floor, where they often
offset active spreading ridges to form a zigzag plate boundary. However,
the most famous transform boundaries are found on land.
The most well known transform boundary in the world is the San Andreas
fault. The scientists predict that in about ten million years, Los Angeles
and San Francisco will be side by side.[1]
Magnetic Reversal
 A switch in the direction of Earths magnetic field so that
the magnetic north pole becomes the magnetic south
pole
 A geomagnetic reversal is a change in the orientation
of Earth's magnetic field such that the positions of
magnetic north and magnetic south become
interchanged.
 These events often involve an extended decline in field
strength followed by a rapid recovery after the new
orientation has been established.
 These events occur on a scale of tens of thousands of
years or longer, with the latest one (the Brunhes–
Matuyama reversal) occurring 780,000 years ago
Hot Spot
 An area where a column of hot material
rises from deep within a planet’s mantle
 In geology, a hotspot or hot spot is a
portion of the Earth's surface that may be
far from tectonic plate boundaries and
that experiences volcanism due to a
rising mantle plume or some other
cause.[1]
Subduction
 The process which an oceanic tectonic plate sinks
under another plate
 In geology, subduction is the process that takes place
at convergent boundaries by which one tectonic plate
moves under another tectonic plate, sinking into the
Earth's mantle, as the plates converge.
 A subduction zone is an area on Earth where two
tectonic plates move towards one another and
subduction occurs.
 Rates of subduction are typically measured in
centimeters per year, with the average rate of
convergence being approximately 2 to 8 centimeters
per year (about the rate a fingernail grows).[1]