The Big Five (Oceans)
This ocean is the largest on Earth, containing 80% of all ocean water.
What is the Pacific Ocean?
These are vast, flat, or gently sloping areas of the deep ocean floor.
What are abyssal plains?
This common chemical compound, also known as table salt, is the primary salt found in seawater.
What is NaCl (Sodium Chloride)?
These are fast-moving, large, and destructive waves usually triggered by undersea events.
What are tsunamis?
Tides are the rise and fall of sea levels caused by the gravitational pull of these two celestial bodies.
What are the moon and the sun?
This ocean gets its name from the Greek "Sea of Atlas" and has the largest drainage area from major rivers.
What is the Atlantic Ocean?
This shallow, submerged edge of a continent is where most coastal activity occurs.
What is the continental shelf?
Seawater is a dilute solution of salts caused by these two processes acting on continental rocks.
What are weathering and erosion?
This term describes a current that moves in a circular fashion, influenced by wind and the Coriolis effect.
What is a gyre?
This type of tide occurs when the Moon, Earth, and Sun are all in a line with each other.
What is a spring tide?
Known as the youngest ocean, it features four distinct climate zones, including monsoon and trade wind zones.
What is the Indian Ocean?
This 40,000-mile long mountain range is formed by plate tectonics.
What is the mid-ocean ridge?
While 96.5% of seawater is pure water, this percentage represents the amount of salt present.
What is 2.5%?
Surface currents are caused by the Earth's rotation and these types of winds.
What are prevailing winds?
During a spring tide, the ocean experiences this, characterized by higher highs and lower lows.
What is the maximum tidal range?
This ocean surrounds Antarctica and contains the 600-mile wide Drake Passage.
What is the Southern Ocean?
This specific deep, narrow canyon is the deepest point in the world's oceans.
What is the Mariana Trench?
To make a liquid thinner or weaker by adding a solvent like water is to do this to it.
What is dilute?
The high point of a wave is the crest; this is the name for the low point.
What is the trough?
This type of tide occurs during the 1st and 3rd quarter moon phases.
What is a neap tide?
Both the Southern and this smallest ocean experience the "midnight sun" in summer and continual darkness in winter.
What is the Arctic Ocean?
The oceanic crust is primarily made of this type of volcanic rock, which is then covered by layers of sediment.
What is basalt?
Besides rock particles and marine organisms, the sediment on the ocean floor includes materials formed by these.
What are chemical reactions?
This effect, caused by Earth's rotation, is what makes water move in a circular motion.
What is the Coriolis effect?
A neap tide results in a minimum tidal range because of this specific factor between the sun and moon.
What is the angle of the sun and moon?