Continental Drift Lab Report

In 1596- Abraham Ortelius took note that the coastlines of the continents seemed to be too fitting together. He initiated a theory that stated that the continents were probably joined at one point in time and were torn apart between Europe and Africa. In the year of 1912, Alfred Wegener stated that the continents were once joined in a supercontinent called Pangea.

The first, would be Land features. Alfred Wegener saw how the coal fields in North America and Europe lined up, he also realized that mountain ranges in North America and Africa lined up. The second, evidence he used were the fossils. There were three types of fossils he found the first was the glossopteris a fern like plant found in Africa, South America, Australia, India, and Antarctica. The second and third were the Mesosaurus and the Lystrosaurus fossils, they were freshwater reptile fossils on continents separated by oceans. The third evidence Alfred Wegener used was, the climate zones. Alfred Wegener looked at the past of the climates and he found scratches in rocks from glaciers in South Africa. Those were the three main evidences Alfred Wegener used to prove Continental Drift

Amerigo Vespucci was an Italian explorer, a navigator and a cosmographer from the Renaissance period (1451-1512). He is remembered for several important reasons, especially for promoting a scientific approach to access the world. On his first expedition, Vespucci explored the Amazon river, which in present-day covers the region of Brazil in South America. Also, as opposed to the early methods used by navigators, who estimated their position based on their previous location and the distance traveled, Vespucci took accurate navigational measurements and referred to the position of the stars and the moon to determine the longitude. Also, by accurately calculating the length of the equator, he helped determine the size of the earth. However, he made his most important scientific contribution, using his astronomical observations, when he identified that the lands discovered by Columbus were not part of Asia as thought by many Europeans at the time, but were a completely separate continent. To honor Vespucci’s great discovery, the continents of the western hemisphere were eventually named after his first name and was thus called America.

2. The theory of “Pangaea” exists suggesting that the continents were once nestled together into one mega-continent. The continents then spread out as drifting islands.

About 225 million years ago, according to the theory of “Pangaea,” the world was once a single supercontinent that contained all the dry land. Approximately 10 million years ago, North America was shaped by the majestic Canadian Shield. About 2 million years ago, in North America, the grand glaciers laid the land of Canada and the United States, southbound as far as from Pennsylvania all the way to the Pacific Northwest. Recently, about 135 million to 25 million years ago, four massive ranges—the Rockies, the Sierra Nevada, the Cascades, and the Coast Ranges, arose in western North America. About 35000 years ago, the ancestors of the Native Americans, the nomadic Asian hunters, first

Between 280 million and 225 million years ago, the earth’s previously separated land areas became welded into a landmass called Pangaea. About 120 million years ago, due to the continental drift, this landmass began to separate. It split the old world and the new world apart, which dividing North and South America from Eurasia and Africa. The separation lasted for million years that it fostered divergent evolution. The new world and the old world’s biological evolution followed individual paths, becoming two separate biological worlds. However, after 1492, human voyagers reversed this tendency. In October 1492, Christopher Columbus and his crew landed in Bahamas. After Columbus arrived in

Millions of years ago according to scientist the whole world was one large mass called Pangea. When this mass began to split, it divided the Americas from the Eastern World along with the people on it. This resulted in tens of thousands years apart from one another which led to different developments on each continent. After all these years though a man named Columbus’s discovers the Americas in 1492. As soon as he took

About 200 million years ago there was one big continent called Pangaea. They believed that, this landmass began to separate. They believed that the Atlantic Ocean formed, dividing Africa and Eurasia from the Americas. Over the next several million years plants and animals changed and made to separate biological worlds. It wasn’t until Christopher Columbus and his crew sailed to the Americas in October 1492, they started interacting with each other.

Who proposed that all of the present continents were once joined together in a single supercontinent called Pangaea?

Much proof of the evolution of organisms and change in the environment overall is shown through fossils. Some of the most unusual fossils found in Australia were disovered at Riversleigh. Animals such as the Lungfish show a strong development in animals as adaptations are cleary seen through, for example, the fact the the lungfish has developed, working lungs that it can us to breathe with on land unlike any other fish. The lungfish shows the tranformation of fish swimming only being ablt to live in water to fish adapting and being able to live on land whilst their body has become dry in the dry season. It shows the evolution from sealife to land life and shows inbetweens for the evolution of the creatures. There are also records of many ancestors of animals that walk the earth today. examples include primative koalas and wombats, a range of ancestral thylacines and platypus, aswe as rodents whch show the evolution of placental mammals. Many of these organisms evolved from what they were and adapted as the climate changed to suit more and became the animals we see today. many similar types of flora and fauna fossils as well as the formation of rocks are similar so due to the continental drift. the continental drift is the drifting apart of all continents from one full land mass into the locations they are currently in. all landmasses were original joined as one big land mass caled 'Pangaea', because all organisms existed on a single land mass aswell, similar fossils can be found, as can rock formations. some evidence of continental drift was that a man named Alfred Wegener went out and matched up the same rock ike a puzzle with different pieces from different parts of the world and they

First, everything was a giant land mass, then it started separating into the continents and oceans formed in between. We know this because the same species of fish live in waters that are very far apart from one another. By 10 million years ago the basic shape had been created. All the moving of the earth’s crust caused it to push up mountains, the Appalachians are probably older than the continental split, the rest of the mountains (in U.S.) are newer.

The theory of Pangaea suggests that the continents were once stuck together into one huge continent. Eventually they started drifting into separated landmasses, which gave birth to the modern continents.

Geologists believe that between 280 million and 225 million years ago, the earth’s previously separate land areas became welded into a landmass called Pangaea. About 120 million years ago, they believe, this landmass began to separate. As this happened, the Atlantic Ocean formed, dividing the Americas from Africa and Eurasia. Over the course of the next several million years in both the Americas and in Afro-Eurasia, biological evolution followed individual paths, creating two primarily separate biological worlds. However, when Christopher Columbus and his crew made land in the Bahamas in October 1492, these two long-separated worlds were reunited. Columbus’ voyage, along with the many voyages that followed, disrupted much of the biological segregation brought about by continental drift.

2. What was the first line of evidence that led early investigators to suspect that the continents were once connected?

In the middle of the eighteenth century, James Hutton proposed a theory, uniformitarianism; “the present is the key to the past”. It held that processes such as geologic forces- gradual and catastrophic-occurring in the present were the same that operated in the past. (Matt Rosenberg, 2004) This theory coincides with the theory of Continental Drift that was first proposed by Abraham Ortelius in December 1596, who suggested that North, South America, Africa and Eurasia were once connected but had been torn apart by earthquakes and floods. He also discovered that the coasts of the eastern part of South America and the