GEOL 100 Lecture 3: Plate tectonics
Document Summary
Mountain ranges built by collisions and slow speed crashes. Zig-zag ridges are a step in seafloor. Trench: narrow, elongated hole, one part of surface is getting shoved underneath. Japan is the top of an underwater mountain range. Most earthquake/volcano prone area of the world. When continents rip apart, trenches form with water possibly (the red sea)-called a rift. Postulated a supercontinent pangaea had existed about 200 million years before in 1915 in the origin of the continents and oceans . Started the geologic community down the road to plate tectonics. Latitude: degrees n or s from equator. Longitude: degrees e or q of prime meridian. High latitude = close to one of the poles. International date line is opposite (180 degrees from) the prime meridian. Similar rock assemblages and ages across oceans. Fossil remains on different continents with different climates and conditions. Glacial striations from 245 ma showing direction that glacier flowed. Always flow downhill, from cooler to warmer levels.
