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Plate tectonics (from Latin tectonicus, from Ancient Greek τεκτονικός (tektonikós) 'pertaining to building') [1] is the scientific theory that the Earth's lithosphere comprises a number of large tectonic plates, which have been slowly moving since 3–4 billion years ago.
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.
Plate tectonics map from NASA. This is a list of tectonic plates on Earth's surface. Tectonic plates are pieces of Earth's crust and uppermost mantle, together referred to as the lithosphere.
The North American plate is a tectonic plate containing most of North America, Cuba, the Bahamas, extreme northeastern Asia, and parts of Iceland and the Azores.With an area of 76 million km 2 (29 million sq mi), it is the Earth's second largest tectonic plate, behind the Pacific plate (which borders the plate to the west).
Obduction zones occurs when the continental plate is pushed under the oceanic plate, but this is unusual as the relative densities of the tectonic plates favours subduction of the oceanic plate. This causes the oceanic plate to buckle and usually results in a new mid-ocean ridge forming and turning the obduction into subduction. [citation needed]
Plate tectonics (from Latin tectonicus, from Ancient Greek τεκτονικός (tektonikós) 'pertaining to building') 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 theory of continental drift has since been validated and incorporated into the science of plate tectonics, which studies the movement of the continents as they ride on plates of the Earth's lithosphere. [2] The speculation that continents might have "drifted" was first put forward by Abraham Ortelius in 1596.
Extensional tectonics is associated with the stretching and thinning of the crust or the lithosphere.This type of tectonics is found at divergent plate boundaries, in continental rifts, during and after a period of continental collision caused by the lateral spreading of the thickened crust formed, at releasing bends in strike-slip faults, in back-arc basins, and on the continental end of ...