Earth Sciences 2240F/G Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Oceanic Crust, Plate Tectonics, Continental Crust
19 Dec 2012
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Document Summary
Intro: differentiation of earth into zoned structure, sources of internal heat, concept of plates driven by heat energy. Chapter 3: theory of plate tectonics from the concept of continental drift (wegener"s hypothesis), mechanisms occurring inside earth that were caused by evolution of heat. Internal energy processes are sudden release of large amounts of energy internal to the earth volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, but not landslides. Parts: outer core of metal, with an ill-defined outer boundary that"s likely characterized by. Inner core of nearly pure metal pools of a mixed composition of metals and silicates: core mantle of dense silicate and oxide minerals. The very upper-most part of the mantle is relatively cold and brittle, and reacts to large-scale processes, as does the crust. The term to identify the crust +brittle upper mantle is the lithosphere: crust, thin outer shell part of the lithosphere (with the brittle upper mantle, oceans and atmosphere.
