Geological Time
Earthquake
Tectonic Plates
Wild Card
Challenge Questions
100
What method of dating rocks uses the decay of radioactive isotopes to calculate age?
What is absolute age dating?
100
What is the name for the point on Earth's surface directly above the earthquake's origin?
What is the epicenter?
100
What are the three types of tectonic plate motions?
what are Convergent, Divergent, and Transform?
100
The theory that says Earth’s outermost layer is broken into plates that move because of mantle convection.
What is Plate Tectonic Theory?
100
At this boundary, magma is generated by decompression melting because rocks rise and cross the solidus at lower pressures. (depressurization)
What is an Ocean-Ocean Divergent boundary (the Mid-Ocean Ridge)?
200
According to the principle of superposition, where in a sequence of undisturbed sedimentary layers would you find the oldest rocks?
What is the bottom layer?
200
Which seismic wave is the fastest and can travel through solids, liquids, and gases?
What is a P-wave?
200
What name is given to the brittle outer layer of Earth, composed of the crust and upper mantle?
What is the Lithosphere?
200
These surface waves produce zig-zag or loop-the-loop motions and cause the most damage.
What are Surface Waves
200
These two fold types influence earthquake damage differently because one focuses seismic energy while the other diffuses it. (name both)
What are Synclines (focus) and Anticlines (diffuse)?
300
Which type of unconformity involves sedimentary rocks overlying igneous or metamorphic rocks?
What is a nonconformity?
300
What do we call the type of stress that pulls materials apart, often found at divergent boundaries?
What is extensional stress?
300
Where is new oceanic crust formed?
What is the mid-ocean ridge?
300
The principle that says any fragment found within a rock must be older than the rock containing it.
What is the Principle of Inclusions?
300
Sort the layers on the image below (include any unconformities)
E Nonconformity G L C H Disconformity M D J A Disconformity N K B Tilting F
400
What type of fossil is geographically widespread, easily recognizable, and lived for a short geological time span?
What is an index fossil?
400
How many seismograms are required to accurately determine the epicenter of an earthquake?
what is three?
400
The three ways you can make a rock melt are: Increasing temperature, increasing pressure, and _______?
What is Flux Melting?
400
A zone of shallow to deep earthquakes that marks a subducting plate descending into the mantle.
What is the Wadati-Benioff Zone?
400
The three ways to produce Magma
What are adding water, decreasing pressure, and increasing temperature?
500
How old is a rock sample if its parent isotope has a half-life of 1,000 years and 3 half-lives have passed?
What is 3,000 years?
500
We know the center of the Earth has a liquid section in it because of which wave?
S waves. Because they can't travel through liquids.
500
which plate tectonic type do we find the deepest hypocenters at?
What is a Convergent boundary? (oceanic-continental collision)
500
A gap in the rock record caused by erosion or a long period of non-deposition.
What is an Unconformity?
500
If a rock has a half-life of 250 years, how much time has passed when there are only 1/16th parents remaining?
What is 1000 years?