1. Plate Tectonics

2. What is Plate Tectonics?
Earth’s surface is made of rigid slabs of rock called plates that move with respect to each other.

3. Alfred Wegener
Nearly 100 years ago, a German scientist named Alfred Wegener proposed a radical idea. He proposed to his colleagues that the continents were not fixed to the earth’s surface, but rather they were in constant motion which he called Continental Drift.

4. Wegener’s Proposal cont.
In addition, Wegener also proposed that millions of years ago, all the continents were part of a supercontinent which he named Pangaea

5. Pangaea

6. Evidence
As you may guess, no one believed him. He need proof. So he began his investigation to prove his theory. He researched three different areas: Climate, Rocks, and Fossils.

7. Climate
Wegener suggested, at the time of Pangaea, parts of South America, Africa, India, and Australia were located closer to Antarctica and would have been much colder and possibly covered by glaciers.

8. Rocks
Wegener analyzed sediment deposits and glacial grooves cut into the rock from each continent. He found similarities in sediment deposits and grooves carved by glaciers that helped support his theory.

11. Evidence of Glaciation

12. Rock Evidence
The Caledonian and Appalachian Mountains appear to be a single mountain chain composed of the same rock type, age, and structure.

13. Fossil Evidence
Glossopteris An ancient plant that lived in a warm wet climate. The fossils have been found in South America, Africa, India, and Australia. Today, these continents are separated by vast oceans and it would impossible for seeds to travel that far.

14. Glossopteris

15. Mesosaur

16. Distribution of Glossopteris and Mesosuar

17. More Fossil Evidence

18. Separation of the Supercontinent
120 million years ago Pangaea split into two giant land masses, Gondwanaland and Laurasia

19. Gondwanaland
Gondwanaland remained in the southern hemisphere and consists of Africa, South America, Arabia, India, Australia, and Antarctica.

20. Laurasia
Laurasia moved to the north and was composed of North America and Europe and Asia

21. The Breakup of Pangaea

22. How the Continents Move

24. Lithosphere
The cold, rigid outermost layer of the Earth is known as the lithosphere. The lithosphere is thicker below the continents and thinnest at the mid-ocean ridges. The lithosphere forms the floating plates. The largest plate is the Pacific plate and the smallest is the Juan de Fuca plate.

25. Asthenosphere
The layer below the lithosphere is the asthenosphere. This layer is so hot that it behaves like a plastic material that flows.

26. Plate Boundaries
Plate boundaries are located anywhere that two or more plates interact. There are three types of boundaries: Divergent, Convergent, and Transform.

27. Divergent Plate Boundaries
A divergent plate boundary forms where two plates separate.

28. Rift Valley
A rift valley is a divergent plate boundary that occurs in the middle of a continent.

29. Rift Valleys

30. Mid-ocean ridges are mountain ranges in the middle of the oceans.

31. Seafloor Spreading
Seafloor spreading is the process by which new oceanic crust forms along a mid-ocean ridge. As new crust is formed, older oceanic crust moves away for the ridge.

32. Seafloor Spreading

33. Convergent Plate Boundaries
Convergent Plate boundaries form where two plates collide. The denser plate sinks below the more buoyant plate in a process called subduction. The are three main types of convergent boundaries: Ocean-to-Continent, Ocean-to-Ocean, and Continent-to-Continent

34. Ocean-to-Continent

35. Mount Rainier in Washington State
Ocean-to-Continent
Mount Rainier in Washington State

36. Ocean-to-Ocean

37. The Marianas Trench
The Marianas Trench is the deepest location on the planet at 36,200 feet, (6.9 miles), deep. At that depth the pressure on a body is 8 tons or 16,000 lbs!

38. Mariana Trench

39. SCARY CREATURES IN MARIANAS TRENCH

46. Continent-to-Continent

47. Continent-to-Continent
The Himalaya mountains are created by the collision of the Eurasian and Indian Plates

48. Forces Causing Plate Movement

49. Convection Currents
Convection current is the circulation of material caused by differences in temperature and density. Convection currents in the mantle are created by the decay of radioactive elements such as uranium, thorium, and potassium heating the surrounding rock.

50. Convection Currents cont.
The heated rock becomes less dense, rises to the crust, cools and sinks back down to be heated again. These convection currents cause three forces to act on the crust: Basal Drag, Ridge Push, and Slab Pull

51. Basal Drag
Convection currents in the asthenosphere circulate and drag the lithosphere similar to a conveyor belt.

52. Ridge Push
Mid-oceanic ridges have a greater elevation than the surrounding seafloor. Because the mid- ocean ridges are higher, gravity pulls the surrounding rock down and away from the ridge. The rising mantle material at the mid-ocean ridge creates the potential for the plates to move away from the ridge with a force called ridge push.

53. Ridge Push cont.
Ridge push moves the lithosphere in opposite directions away from the mid-ocean ridge.

54. Slab Pull
When tectonic plates collide, the denser plate will sink into the mantle along a subduction zone. This plate is called a slab. Because this slab is old and cold, it sinks, pulling on the rest of the plate with a force called slab pull.

56. In the end, Hess’s work with sonar mapping proved Wegener's basic idea right and clarified the mechanism that broke the once-joined continents into the seven we know today and so began the modern Theory of Plate Tectonics