EESA06H3 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Oceanic Crust, Plate Tectonics, Supercontinent
18 Jun 2017
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Document Summary
We study rocks to understand the evolution of the planet. Creating an order of events in earth history. Paradigm a revolution in thinking (ex. discovering dna or radioactivity) There is nowhere on the earth"s surface that"s stable. Pangea (a supercontinents) fused continents billions of years ago. Supercontinent cycle the assembling and disassembling of continents. Outcrops where you can actually see rocks in the field, which we than question/analyze. Years ago there was thin ice sheets which pushed the crust down, but since it has melted the crust is still in the process of bounding back up (similar to a rubber band). In terms of the supercontinent, when all the continents are stuck together it traps heat. The heat causes the land mass to rise, and that supercontinent will be torn apart. Plume hot rocks that travel from the earth"s core to the crust. Decompression melting rising plumes start to melt and produce magma.
