Essay on Plate Tectonics Explained

There are three main layers on the Earth. The first is, the crust, the outer layer of Earth. It’s everywhere, on dry land and the ocean floor, however it’s

Plate boundaries are pieces of earths’ crust and upper mantle interacting with each other. There are three ways these plates can interact with each other, transform, convergent, and divergent. When plates transform to each other, they are when two plates slide past each other, currently there are transforming plates in California right now. Convergent plates are two plates going towards each other, one going other the other, and the other overlapping. The final type is divergent plates, two plates going away from each other, one of these is found between North

There are three distinct types of plate boundaries existing, which are supported by geological observation, geophysical data, and theoretical considerations. Their names and categories are based on if adjacent plates move apart from each other (divergent plate margins), toward one another (convergent plate margins), or slip past one another in a direction parallel to their common boundary (transform plate margins) (Pitman, W.C., 2007).

Plate tectonics are very dangerous when they collide,slide,and move apart. They can create mountains like the Appalachian Mountains that used to tower over everything then erosion took place. The Appalachian Mountains were formed by convergent boundaries, convergent boundaries are collide

The breaking apart of this supercontinent was due to the movement of the Earth's Tectonic Plates. Tectonic Plates are large masses of the lithosphere or outer layer of the Earth's surface. The layers included in the Lithosphere are the Crust up to the upper layer of the Mantle. The Oceanic Crust is thinner and denser than the Continental Crust and can be found underneath the ocean. It is also more active than the Continental Crust that stretches 200 km below the Earth's surface. This crust drifts and moves either horizontally or vertically causing geological phenomenons such as earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, etc. The major tectonic plates are North American, Caribbean, South American, Scotia, Antarctic, Eurasian, Arabian, African, Indian, Philippine, Australian, Pacific, Juan de Fuca, Cocos, and Nazca. These plates move an estimate of 1 to 10 cm per year causing interaction at plate boundaries. When two plates are colliding or moving toward each other it is in Convergent boundaries. If these two plates are Oceanic Crusts, they are in Subduction zones wherein the denser plate in forced beneath the less dense plate and would eventually melt or destroy. On the other hand, when two plates move away from each other it is in Divergent boundaries. New crust material from molten magma formed below may fill the space between these plates or become ocean basins.

The Jovian (gas) planets formed by a similar process but with less solid materials and with much more gas that was blown further out by the solar winds. Jupiter and the rest of the gas giant probably contain a solid core, of rock and other metals. Although none of the gas planets have a solid surface like we do on earth, only a thicker and thicker atmosphere until reaching the core. It’s important to note, that because Jupiter is so large (317 times the mass of the earth, 1321 times bigger by volume), and has such large pressure on the interior, elements found as gases on earth could possibly be a solid or vice versa. For example, metallic hydrogen (which is a state where hydrogen behaves as an electrical conductor) is only still a theory since we are unable to create the pressures needed here on earth. Metallic hydrogen is known as the Holy Grail in high pressure physics.

The thicker sections fo the plates are the continents; the thinner parts make up the ocean beds. When two plates meet, the result is geologic upheaval on a vast scale. Such an encounter occurred about 20 million years ago in the region between North and South America. The Cocos Plate, a piece of the Pacific crust some 300 miles wide, moved eastward until it met the crustal plate underlying the Caribbean. The eastern edge of the Cocos Plate was driven beneath the western edge of the Caribbean Plate. As the Cocos Plate was forced downward, the friction, as well as the hear deep within the earth, liquefied its rock into magma, which found release by thrusting up in a chain of volcanoes. The volcanic islands that resulted formed a line of stepping-stones between the northern and southern

The seven major tectonic plates comprise mostly on continental plates and the Pacific plate. The seven major plates from greatest to least are called: the Pacific Plate stretching 103,300,000 km2, North American Plate being 75,900,000 km2, Eurasian Plate being 67,800,000 km2, African Plate stretching 61,300,000 km2, Antarctic Plate being 60,900,000 km2, Australian Plate being 47,000,000 km2, and the South American Plate being 43,600,000 km2. With different tectonic plates, there are different ways they can move: divergent, convergent, and transform. Divergent plate movement is when both plates moving away from each other, creating a canyon that has magma pushing out from the bottom, forming new ground. Convergent is usually an oceanic plate and a continental plate are moving into one another, causing the oceanic plate to subducts into the mantle. This causes move active volcanos and earthquakes. Even though all of the plates are in the lithosphere, it's only the where Earth is flexible enough to move rather than flow. The lithosphere flexes when loads of weight are placed on it or

Magma frames in either the lower bit of Earth's hull or the upper piece of its mantle. It is delivered when high measures of weight join with high temperatures, bringing about a percentage of the stones in the range to liquefy, making this substance. Without this blend of weight and warm, this substance would not have the capacity to shape.

Types of plate boundaries can form many volcanoes. These boundaries are called spreading and colliding boundaries. Along the boundaries, a belt of volcanoes starts to form. This is called the Ring of Fire. Along mid ocean ridges, volcanoes form because of spreading boundary. They can also form on land. The next boundary is the colliding boundary. On colliding boundaries, volcanoes form when two plates in the ocean

On Earth the heavier metals moved toward the core while all the lighter elements like silicates rose to the top. Without the creation of metal materials the antenna, circuit board, and transistors would not be available to make a radio.

In divergent ocean basins, new crust is being formed as the two plates move father and farther away. In contrast, crust is being destroyed at converging ocean basins. Essentially, the two converging plates (and their crust) will collide and form a subduction zone (specific with the crust density). This zone is essentially characterized

On the topic of plate tectonics a convergent boundary is when two or possibly more plates are moving towards each other one going under the other while the other goes over the first. The boundary between the Indian Plate and the Eurasian Plate is a convergent boundary which fuels the formation of the Himalayan mountain range.

Earth is in fact an intricate planet that has multiple layers of differing compositions. To be exact the earth has four main layers. The uppermost layer is the one humans come in most contact with, the crust. The crust consists of “thin silicate rock material”(Structure of the). Although the crust is not entirely the same. Actually there are two distinct types of crust, oceanic and continental. “The continental crust is made up of mostly rocks similar to granite while the oceanic crust is much denser and made up of a material similar to basalt”(Structure of the, Rose). The second layer is called the mantle. “The mantle is much denser than the crust and contains similar to the crust mostly solid silicate crust”(Structure of the). “As we travel further down the earth we wind up in the outer core. The outer core is a core of molten nickel and iron. Finally there’s the inner core. The inner is a solid metal core made up of nickel and iron”(Structure of the). All these layers functioning together cast out a magnetic

The continental crust consists of igneous and sedimentary rocks. The oceanic crust consists of the same with a substantial layer of sediments above the rock. The crust covers the outer ridged layer of the earth called the lithosphere. The lithosphere is divided into seven main continental plates. These continental plates are constantly moving on a viscous base.