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Transcript
Team of Scientists Unveil “Earth Shattering” New Observations to Support Plate Tectonic Theory! By Kinzie Sikkema We all live on the Earth, but most of us don’t care to learn about it. It is an amazing planet, constantly moving through space. But, did you know that it is also changing on itself? The crust of the earth is divided into different “sections” called plates. There are continental crust and oceanic crust. Sometimes when one plate carrying oceanic crust and another plate carrying continental crust meet and bump together, a subduction zone forms. The oceanic crust (the sinking crust) is denser than the continental crust (floating crust), so the oceanic plate dives down beneath the continental plate. This forms a trench. As the sinking crust sinks, it melts and is destroyed. This is called oceanic crust destruction. As the crust melts, the magma needs a place to go. It is forced upwards and forms volcanoes and mountain ranges fairly close to the shore. Won’t we eventually run out of crust you may ask? Well, at the mid-ocean ridge, new crust is being formed through the process of sea-floor spreading. Mantle convection causes new hot rock to be forced to the surface of the crust. This forces the older rock away from the ridge, and sometimes it gets pushed down under a plate of continental crust, forming a subduction zone. The fact that mountains, volcanoes, trenches, ridges, and faults exist proves that plate tectonics are moving. Check out www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plate_tectonics, www.kidsgeo.com/geology-for-kids/0043-plate-tectonics.php, & www.platetectonics.com/book/page_12.asp for more information.