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Pangaea is the most recent supercontinent to have existed and the first to be reconstructed by geologists. Origin of the concept. Alfred Wegener c. 1924–1930World map of Pangaea created by Alfred Wegener to illustrate his concept. The name "Pangaea" is derived from Ancient Greekpan(πᾶν, "all, entire, whole") and Gaiaor Gaea (Γαῖα ...
Alfred Lothar Wegener (/ ˈveɪɡənər /; [ 1 ]German: [ˈʔalfʁeːt ˈveːɡənɐ]; [ 2 ][ 3 ] 1 November 1880 – November 1930) was a German climatologist, geologist, geophysicist, meteorologist, and polar researcher. During his lifetime he was primarily known for his achievements in meteorology and as a pioneer of polar research, but ...
Continental drift is the theory, originating in the early 20th century, that Earth's continents move or drift relative to each other over geologic time. [1] 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.
The geological history of the Earth follows the major geological events in Earth's past based on the geological time scale, a system of chronological measurement based on the study of the planet's rock layers (stratigraphy). Earth formed about 4.54 billion years ago by accretion from the solar nebula, a disk-shaped mass of dust and gas left ...
Earth formed around 4.54 billion years ago, approximately one-third the age of the universe, by accretion from the solar nebula. [ 4 ][ 5 ][ 6 ] Volcanic outgassing probably created the primordial atmosphere and then the ocean, but the early atmosphere contained almost no oxygen.
The Wilson cycle theory is based upon the idea of an ongoing cycle of ocean closure, continental collision, and a formation of new ocean on the former suture zone.The Wilson Cycle can be described in six phases of tectonic plate motion: the separation of a continent (continental rift), formation of a young ocean at the seafloor, formation of ocean basins during continental drift, initiation of ...
Pangaea's supercontinent cycle is a good example of the efficiency of using the presence or lack of these entities to record the development, tenure, and break-up of supercontinents. There is a sharp decrease in passive margins between 500 and 350 Ma during the timing of Pangaea's assembly.
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. [ 2 ][ 3 ][ 4 ] The model builds on the concept of continental ...