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Plate tectonics (from Latin tectonicus, from Ancient Greek τεκτονικός (tektonikós) 'pertaining to building') [1] is the scientific theory that Earth's lithosphere comprises a number of large tectonic plates, which have been slowly moving since 3–4 billion years ago.
The major volcanoes of the Cascade Range are fed from heat generated as tectonic plates dive below North America.. All rock now exposed in the area of the park is volcanic, and unconformably overlies much older sedimentary, metamorphic and igneous rock, [6] which was formed during the hundreds of millions of years when the Lassen region underwent repeated uplifting to form mountains, only to ...
This is due to Earth's high erosional rates and the subduction and subsequent destruction of tectonic plates throughout its 4.5 Ga history. [12] Furthermore, during its existence the primordial crust is thought to have been regularly broken and re-formed by impacts involving other planetesimals. [ 13 ]
Because tectonic plates move across mantle plumes, each volcano becomes inactive as it drifts off the plume, and new volcanoes are created where the plate advances over the plume. The Hawaiian Islands are thought to have been formed in such a manner, as has the Snake River Plain , with the Yellowstone Caldera being part of the North American ...
Indo-Australian plate – Major tectonic plate formed by the fusion of the Indian and Australian plates (sometimes considered to be two separate tectonic plates) – 58,900,000 km 2 (22,700,000 sq mi) Australian plate – Major tectonic plate separated from Indo-Australian plate about 3 million years ago – 47,000,000 km 2 (18,000,000 sq mi)
Cartoon of a tectonic collision between two continents. In geology, continental collision is a phenomenon of plate tectonics that occurs at convergent boundaries.Continental collision is a variation on the fundamental process of subduction, whereby the subduction zone is destroyed, mountains produced, and two continents sutured together.
The plate theory is a model of volcanism that attributes all volcanic activity on Earth, even that which appears superficially to be anomalous, to the operation of plate tectonics. According to the plate theory, the principal cause of volcanism is extension of the lithosphere.
Johannes Kepler considered volcanoes as conduits for the tears and excrement of the Earth, voiding bitumen, tar and sulfur. [21] [better source needed] Descartes, pronouncing that God had created the Earth in an instant, declared he had done so in three layers; the fiery depths, [22] a layer of water, and the air. Volcanoes, he said, were ...