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Plate Tectonics
Review of vocab and content
Term | Definition |
---|---|
earthquake | happens at plate boundaries when rock breaks or hits causing shaking and trembling of the ground |
plate boundaries | edges of plates where rock breaks or hits |
plates | huge, irregularly-shaped pieces of Earth's crust |
bedrock | solid pieces of rock found below the soil or water on Earth's surface; creates the Earth's crust |
convergent boundary | plate boundary created when plates collide |
divergent boundary | plate boundary created when plates separate |
subduction zone | convergent boundary created when an denser ocean plate collides with a lighter land plate |
subduction | happens when the denser ocean plate sinks below the lighter land plate into the mantle where it begins to melt |
volcano | a weak spot in Earth's crust that lets magma rise to the surface; can form at divergent boundaries or subduction zones |
fossil | preserved remains or traces of things that lived long ago |
sediment | broken pieces of rock formed by weathering |
deposits | large quantities of valuable materials inside bedrock |
igneous rock | rock formed when magma or lava cools and hardens |
sedimentary rock | rock formed when layers of sediment solidify sometimes preserving a fossil inside |
metamorphic rock | rock formed by extreme heat and pressure deep in the mantle |
fault line | a break in Earth's crust formed at the plate boundaries |
crust | the outer layer of earth that consists of sediment on the surface and bedrock beneath the surface |
mantle | the middle layer of earth where the bottom part of the bedrock creeps and magma pockets may form |
weathering | breaking down of rock into smaller pieces |
erosion | moving broken rock (sediment) from one place to another |
deposition | laying down sediment in a new location |
creep | the slow movement of rock in the lower mantle |
magnitude | the strength of an earthquake |
correlation | a relationship that exists when two things happen at the same time but one does not cause the other |
causation | a relationship that exists when one thing causes another to happen |
epicenter | the point on Earth's surface directly above the focus of an earthquake |
focus | the place inside earth's crust where an earthquake originates |
transform boundary | a plate boundary formed when two plates slide past each other |
continental crust | less dense parts of the crust that are above sea level |
oceanic crust | more dense parts of the crust that are below sea level |
uplift | process that pushes up bedrock as a result of plate interactions |