Earth S Floor Tectonic Plates

Earth s surface appears to be still but it is actually constantly on the move.

Earth s floor tectonic plates. Its outer shell is made up of huge slabs of moving rock called tectonic plates. This is a list of tectonic plates on earth s surface. Found underneath the pacific ocean it is the largest of all tectonic plates. The idea that our planet s continents drift around the globe periodically glomming together and breaking apart is at least 200 years old but most geologists didn t believe it until the 1960s when mounting evidence made it clear that the earth s crust is broken up into fragments and that those fragments called tectonic plates are moving.

The theory of plate tectonics has done for geology what charles darwin s theory of evolution did for biology. Tectonicus from the ancient greek. Major tectonic plates by size pacific plate 103 300 000 sq km the pacific plate is estimated to be 103 300 000 square kilometers in size. Plate tectonics theory dealing with the dynamics of earth s outer shell that revolutionized earth sciences by providing a uniform context for understanding mountain building processes volcanoes and earthquakes as well as the evolution of earth s surface and reconstructing its past continents and oceans.

The plates fit together like puzzle pieces to make up earth s surface. Oceanic crust also called sima from silicon and magnesium and continental crust sial from silicon and aluminium. There are a total of seven major tectonic plates which cover nearly 95 of the earth s surface. Plate tectonics from the late latin.

Given diagrams scenarios descriptions and illustrations students will identify the historical development and evidence that supports plate tectonic theory and relate plate tectonics to the formation of crustal features. Their movements change the planet s features depending on how the plates meet. For example two hundred million years ago there was only one super continent named pangaea. The theory of plate tectonics is 50 years old but there are many puzzles left to answer says dr kate rychert who studies the geology at the bottom of the atlantic ocean.

Plate tectonics theory formulated in the 1960s and 70s states that the earth s outer crust is composed of moving plates. Plate tectonics also explains how continents mountains volcanoes and earthquakes were created as a by product of continental. Pertaining to building is a scientific theory describing the large scale motion of seven large plates and the movements of a larger number of smaller plates of earth s lithosphere since tectonic processes began on earth between 3 3 and 3 5 billion years ago.