Continental Drift It asserts that all continents are

Continents - landmasses that are made up of lighter rock materials

not submerged underwater
These lighter rocks lie above
7 major continents: heavier crustal materials
North America
South America Phenomenon is similar to icebergs
Europe floating on water
Asia
Africa Primary driver of the theory is the
Antarctica earth’s internal heat
Australia
There was once a supercontinent
Continental Drift theory - explain called pangaea
how continents shift in position on This continent eventually split into
the earth's surface Laurasia = Laurentia (N america) +
●​ Proposed by Alfred Eurasia (Europe and Asia)
Wegener in 1912
●​ Wegener was a german Gondwana = (Antarctica + S
meteorologist and geologist America + Australia + Africa)
A much earlier theory was made by
Abraham Ortelius in the 1500’s These continents eventually split
apart to form our present day
According to Wegener: continents
-​ The relative positions of the
earth’s crust are not Types of Evidence
statistically fixed A.​ Topographic Evidence
-​ Continents are slowly moving -​ Similar outlines of
about 1cm northwest per different continents
year or 1 yard per century -​ Jigsaw puzzle
-​ Mountain ranges from
The energy coming from the core different continents
causes the convection cells of the line up with each other
mantle that made convection B.​ Fossil correlation
currents -​ Same types of
fossilized plants and
Parts of the earth’s crust slowly animals were found in
drift away of a liquid core africa and south
america
-​ Many other fossils -​ Geologic process where
found in only tectonic plates split up and
continents separate oceanic plates move away
from each other from each other
-​ Includes -​ Also a result of mantle
●​ Mesosaurus convection
(freshwater
reptile) Mantle convection - gradual
●​ Lystrosaurus churning motion of the mantle
and
cynognathus -​ Occurs in mid ocean ridges
(land reptiles) -​ Continuous process of
●​ Glossopteris igneous rock formation at
(tropical fern) mid-oceanic ridges
-​ Magma is repeatedly
C.​ Rock distribution injected to form the new
-​ Rock and rock structures in seafloor
different continents are the -​ Older seafloor is found
same where land was once farther away
joined -​ Seafloor elevation
progressively lowers away
D.​ Paleoclimatic evidence from mid-ocean ridges
-​ Fossils from certain -​ Only ends when mid-ocean
continents were found in ridges are subducted
different climatic conditions
-​ Shows that continents moved Proposed by Harry Hess
away from each other (petrologist ) and Robert Dietz
-​ Separation of parts of (oceanographer) in the 1960’s
antarctica that soon became
S america, africa, india, Seafloor bathymetry - study of
australia underwater depth at the ocean
Seafloor Spreading floor
Seafloor - the ground at the
bottom of the sea Echo sounder - measures depth
through the echo of high frequency
Seafloor spreading - the process of sound
creating new seafloor
Satellite altimetry - Profiles the
Seafloor spreading hypothesis shape of the sea surface
Ocean basin - result of tectonic
forces which form from volcanic C.​ Drilling Samples
rock that was released from -​ The samples obtained from
fissures the seafloor drill reveals that
the rocks away from the
Continental shelf - only part of the mid-ocean ridge were
continental crust not submerged in relatively older than the
water rocks nearer to it.
-​ Sediments are thinner at the
5 major ocean basins ridge
-​ Pacific -​ Rocks at the ocean floor are
-​ Atlantic younger than those at
-​ Arctic continents
-​ Indian
-​ southern Subduction at deep-ocean
trenches
Evidences of Seafloor spreading -​ Gravity pulls the denser,
older crust down beneath the
A.​ Molten materials trench.
-​ At the mid-ocean ridge, -​ It allows the ocean floor to
molten material rises up sink back into the mantle
from the mantle and spreads that takes millions of years
out, pushing older rocks to -​ Subduction and seafloor
both sides of the ridge spreading change the size
-​ Rock pillows show that and shape ofthe ocean
molten material has erupted -​ Ocean floor is renewed every
again and again from cracks 200 million years
and cooled quickly -​ Rate of formation of a new
seafloor is not always as fast
B.​ Magnetic stripes as the destruction on the old
-​ Rocks that make up the one.
ocean floor lie in a pattern of
magnetized stipes which hold If subduction is faster than
a record of the reversals in seafloor spreading, the ocean sinks
earth’s magnetic fields. -​ PACIFIC OCEAN
-​ Normal and reversed polarity
in bands paralleling the rift If seafloor spreading is greater
and symmetrically than subduction, the ocean widens
distributing as mirror images -​ ATLANTIC OCEAN
on either side of it.
Subduction in the pacific ocean
-​ Covers ⅓ of the earth but is Parts of the ocean basin
shrinking
-​ There is a ring of trenches 1.​ Mid-Ocean Ridge: An
that surround it underwater mountain range
-​ Deep ocean trench swallows formed by tectonic plates
more than mid ocean ridge spreading apart.
can produce 2.​ Abyssal Plain: A flat, deep
-​ Is new crust is not fast ocean floor covered by
enough, the ocean sinks sediment.
-​ Porcupine, 4560-3850
Subduction in the atlantic ocean deep below
-​ Is expanding 3.​ Ocean Trenches: Deep,
-​ Only has a few trenches narrow depressions in the
-​ Atlantic ocean floor is ocean floor formed at
attached to the continental subduction zones.
crust -​ Japan trench, 9000m
-​ As the seafloor spread, the deep
continents along the edge 4.​ Volcanoes: Openings in
also move Earth's crust where magma
erupts.
Net results 5.​ Submarine Canyons: Steep,
Pacific plates - moves northwest underwater valleys cutting
8cm/yr into the continental slope.
6.​ Rift Valley: A deep valley
N american plate - moves west at formed by tectonic plates
2cm per year diverging.
7.​ Seamount: An underwater
Indian plate - moves northeast at mountain rising from the
12cm/yr ocean floor.
8.​ Ocean Floor: The bottom
Atlantic ocean opened 200m yr layer of the ocean, consisting
ago of plains, ridges, and
Three types of boundaries trenches.
9.​ Continental Rise: The sloped
Convergent - Move toward each region connecting the
other continental slope to the
Divergent - move away from each abyssal plain.
other
Transform - slide past each other
10.​Continental Shelf: The -​ Pacific
submerged, shallow edge of -​ South american
a continent.
11.​Continental Slope: The steep Minor Plates
descent from the continental -​ Arabian plated
shelf to the deep ocean floor. -​ Cocos plate
-​ Caribbean plate
11.5. Guyot - flat topped mountains -​ Indian plate]
-​ Juan de fuca plate
Regions of the ocean basin
-​ Nazca plate
-​ Continental margin
-​ Philippine sea plate
-​ Ocean basin floor
-​ Scotia plate
-​ Mid-ocean ridges

Tectonic plates are also called

Plate tectonics
lithospheric plates
Modern version of Wegener’s
theory
Plate boundary - fracture that
separates each continent from
Theory of the outermost rigid layer
each other
of the earth/lithosphere is broken
into several segments called plates
3 types
which are in motion

Divergent
Movements of plates
-​ Move away from each other
-​ Separate
-​ Can occur on oceanic and
-​ Collide
continental plates
-​ Subduct
-​ Ridge push and slab pull
-​ Slide past each other
-​ Oceanic creates:
●​ Oceanic ridge
There are 7 major plates that make
●​ Fissure eruptions
up 94% of the earths surface and
●​ Shallow earthquake
smaller plates that make up 6,
activity
however there are over 21 total
●​ Creation of new
plates
seafloor and widening
ocean basin
7 major plates
Example:
-​ African
Mid atlantic ridge
-​ Antarctic
-​ Eurasian
-​ Continental creates:
-​ Indo-australian
●​ Rift valley
-​ North american
Example:
The red sea
Convergent
-​ Collide with each other

3 scenarios

Continental - continental -
mountain building process, lifted
up

Oceanic-oceanic - form chain of

volcanic islands called island arc,
subduction

E.g. The Calbuco

Continental-oceanic - oceanic dives

under, continental goes up,
produce deeper trenches and
initiate volcanism

Transform Boundary - slide past

each other

E.g. San andreas fault

Convection - fundamental driving

mechanism for plate motion

Hot rocks rise/less density

Cold rocks sink/ more density