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Antarctica was also part of the ancient supercontinent of Gondwana, which gradually broke up by plate tectonics starting 110 million years ago. The separation of South America from Antarctica 30–35 million years ago allowed the Antarctic Circumpolar Current to form, which isolated Antarctica climatically and caused it to become much colder.
Gondwana ( / ɡɒndˈwɑːnə /) [1] was a large landmass, sometimes referred to as a supercontinent. The remnants of Gondwana make up around two-thirds of today's continental area, including South America, Africa, Antarctica, Australia, Zealandia, Arabia, and the Indian Subcontinent. Gondwana was formed by the accretion of several cratons ...
The name "Pangaea" is derived from Ancient Greek pan (πᾶν, "all, entire, whole") and Gaia or Gaea (Γαῖα, " Mother Earth, land"). [4][9] The first to suggest that the continents were once joined and later separated may have been Abraham Ortelius in 1596. [10] The concept that the continents once formed a contiguous land mass was ...
The deglaciation of the Antarctic Peninsula largely occurred between 18,000 and 6,000 years ago as an interglacial climate was established in the region. It initially started about 18,000 to 14,000 years ago with retreat of the ice sheet from the Pacific outer continental shelf and the continental margin within the Weddell Sea.
The icing of Antarctica began in the Late Palaeocene or middle Eocene between 60 [121] and 45.5 million years ago [122] and escalated during the Eocene–Oligocene extinction event about 34 million years ago. CO 2 levels were then about 760 ppm [123] and had been decreasing from earlier levels in the thousands of ppm.
1991. The Mesozoic Era[3] is the era of Earth's geological history, lasting from about 252 to 66 million years ago, comprising the Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous Periods. It is characterized by the dominance of gymnosperms and of archosaurian reptiles, such as the dinosaurs; a hot greenhouse climate; and the tectonic break-up of Pangaea.
Timeline of glaciation. There have been five or six major ice ages in the history of Earth over the past 3 billion years. The Late Cenozoic Ice Age began 34 million years ago, its latest phase being the Quaternary glaciation, in progress since 2.58 million years ago. Within ice ages, there exist periods of more severe glacial conditions and ...
The geologic time scale is a way of representing deep time based on events that have occurred throughout Earth's history, a time span of about 4.54 ± 0.05 Ga (4.54 billion years). [5] It chronologically organises strata, and subsequently time, by observing fundamental changes in stratigraphy that correspond to major geological or ...