Vocabulary
Structure of the Earth
Continental Drift Theory
Plate Tectonics
Relative and Absolute Dating
100
The thinnest layer of the Earth
What is the crust
100
There are ______________ main layers of the Earth.
What is four
100
Created the Continental Drift Theory
Who is Alfred Wegener
100
Earthquakes and Volcanoes are usually located in relation to these
What is a plate boundary
100
When scientists look at patterns in rock formations to determine the squence of events.
What is relative dating?
200
A number of rigid, but moving, pieces of Earth's surface
What is tectonic plates.
200
The thickest layer of the Earth
What is the mantle.
200
Wegener's evidence to support his theory (2 pieces of evidence).
What is similar fossils found on separate continents, and continents fit together due to shape?
200
The mid-ocean ridge is an example of a ____________________ boundary and ___________________ occurs here where new ocean floor is formed.
What is divergent boundary; sea-floor spreading
200
A law used in relative dating that explains that pieces of rock with in a larger rock formation are older.
What is Law of Inclusion?
300
Rock created from heat and pressure.
What is metamorphic rock.
300
Plates float on top of the _______________________.
What is the asthenosphere
300
This theory explained that the Earth's crust was divided into plates that moved atop a plastic mantle.
What is Plate Tectonics Theory?
300
When plates slide past each other.
What is transform boundary?
300
What scientist use to determine an exact age, or an estimated age.
What is absolute dating?
400
the process of an isotope of a substance breaking down to another substance.
What is radioactive decay?
400
The rigid part of the Earth including the crust and the upper mantle (makes up the plates of the Earth)
What is the lithosphere
400
The name of the super-continent that existed 250 million years ago.
What is Pangea?
400
This is the mechanism (what causes) the plates to move
What is convection cycles in the mantle?
400
The amount of time it takes for a substance to decay to half of the starting amount.
What is a half-life?
500
Although the hottest layer of the Earth, this layer is solid metal
What is the inner core
500
If the core stopped producing heat, this would happen to the plates.
What is convection currents would stop and the plates would stop moving?
500
Continental Drift Theory was not accepted because it did not explain this
What is how the continents moved?
500
The two types of convergent boundaries
What is subduction (between an oceanic and continental plate, causes volcanoes) and collision (between 2 continental plates, causes mountains)?
500
Useful in determining an estimated age of a rock because the organism occurred for a short time period, and is found on many continents.
What is an index fossil?
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