Academic Earth/Space Science : FINAL!!

Timlin, Block 3

Pangea

Name of supercontinent proposed by Alfred Wegner meaning all land, existed about 200 million years ago.

Mesosaurus

One of Wegner's proof of fossil evidence for continental drift. Wegner believed that South america and Africa must have joined when the dinosaur lived.

5-15 centimeters a year

How fast do plates of the lithosphere move?

Lithosphere

From which layers of Earth are plates composed?

divergent boundary

Found where two of Earth's plates move apart. Oceanic lithosphere is created. Most are spreading centers located along crests of mid ocean ridges, some may occur on the continents.

Convergent boundary

Form where two plates move together. Lithosphere can be destroyed. Plates collide and interact, producing features like trenches, volcanoes, and mountain ranges.

Transform boundary

Plates may grind past each other without destroying the lithosphere

oceanic-continental convergent boundary

When oceanic lithosphere is subducted beneath a continental plate, it creates a continental volcanic arc.

Oceanic-oceanic convergent boundary

When one oceanic plate is subducted beneath another oceanic plate, it forms a volcanic island arc.

Continental-continental convergent boundary

When continental lithosphere cannot be fully subducted, because it isn't very dense. The collision of two continents forms mountain ranges.

along mid-ocean ridges

Where are the majority of transform faults on earth?

Reveals that the poles switch positions, proves paleomagnetism

What does a magnetic reversal reveal?

Mantle convection from earths internal heat

What is the ultimate cause of plate movement?

Principle of Uniformitarianism

The idea that physical, chemical, and biological laws that operate today also operated in the past.

Cross cutting relationships

States that a fault or intrusion must be younger than any geologic formation through which it cuts.

Relative dating

Identifies the chronological order in which rocks formed, but not the exact age. Can tell us the sequence in which events occurred, but not how long ago.

Sedimentary rocks

In what type of rock are fossils found?

If something posses hard parts it has a better chance of becoming a fossil

What is the significance of hard parts in fossil formation?

Fossil succession

States that fossil organisms tend to be found in the same general order at different locations.

They are used for relative dating, and to define geological periods

What's the importance of index fossils?

Developed by Charles Darwin, explains why we evolve and how it helps us survive

What is the significance of the theory of evolution?

After one half life, half parent material half daughter project, etc.

How do you read and interpret a radiometric decay curve?

When an organism dies the amount of carbon-14 gradually decreases as the carbon-14 decays, by comparing the ratio of carbon-14 to carbon-12 in a sample, radiocarbon dates can be determined.

What is the significance of carbon-14 in radiometric dating?

4.54 billion years old

What is the approximate age of Earth?

Eons

The four long units that Earth's history is divided into.

Eras

There are three within the Phanerozoic eon, the Paleozoic, Mesozoic, and Cenozoic.

Periods

What each era is divided into, different geologic events, environmental conditions and life forms characterize them.

Epochs

What periods are divided into.

3.5 billion

What is the age of the oldest fossils on Earth?

Precambrian, Paleozoic, Mesozoic, Cenozoic

What is the relative order of the eras of Earths history?

The sea from cyanobacteria

Where did life originate according to modern scientific theory?

By coal deposits, when coal formed

How was the carboniferous named?

The precambrian (88% of earths history)

What is the longest division of geologic time?

Summer solstice

First day of summer, June 20 or 21, axis is leaning 23.5 degrees north, tropic of cancer.

Winter solstice

First day of winter, December 21 or 22, axis is leaning 23.5 degrees south, tropic of Capricorn.

Spring equinox

Occurs on March 19th or 20th, marks start of spring, 0 degrees latitude, sun's rays strike the equator, day is equal to night.

Autumnal equinox

Start of autumn, September 22 or 23, 0 degrees latitude, sun's rays strike equator, day is equal to night.

Conduction

The transfer of heat through matter by molecular activity.

Convection

The transfer of heat by mass movement or circulation within a substance.

Radiation

Mechanism of heat transfer where energy travels out in all direction from its source, does not need a conductor.

The higher up you are the colder it will be

How do altitudes affect climate?

Land heats and cools more rapidly than water

Differences in heating of land and water?

Leeward coast

Location where prevailing winds blow from the land to the ocean (get their winds from land). more extreme temperatures and hotter and drier.

Windward coast

a coastal location where prevailing winds blow from the ocean onto the shore (get their winds from water)

High albedo

Clouds that reflect a significant portion of the sunlight that strikes them back to space

Low albedo

When clouds absorb radiation from the land

Rain, sleet, snow, hail, freezing rain

What are the various forms of precipitation?

Rain

drops of water that fall from a cloud and have a diameter of at least .5 millimeters

Snow

precipitation falling from clouds in the form of ice crystals

sleet

the fall of small particles of clear to translucent ice

Glaze

Also known as freezing rain, results when raindrops become supercooled, they fall through subfreezing air near the ground and turn to ice when they impact objects

Hail

Produced in cumulonimbus clouds, hailstones begin as small ice pellets that grow by collecting supercooled water droplets as they fall through clouds, if the pellets encounter a strong updraft they will either be carried back or fall to the ground.

Evaporation

Liquid to a gas, heat is absorbed

Condensation

Gas to a liquid, heat is released

Sublimation

Solid to a gas, heat is absorbed

Deposition

Gas to a solid, heat is released

Melting

Solid to a liquid, heat is absorbed

Freezing

Liquid to a solid, heat is released

Stratus clouds

means a layer, clouds are sheets or layers that cover much or all of the sky.

nimbus clouds

Rainy cloud

cirrus clouds

means a curl of hair, clouds are white, thin, and found high in the atmosphere.

Cumulus clouds

means a pile, consist of rounded individual cloud masses

The pressure gradient force (differences in air pressure)

What force generates winds?

High pressure system

Anticyclones are centers of high pressure, air spirals outwards in a clockwise pattern in the northern hemisphere (counterclockwise in the southern hemisphere).

Low pressure system

Found in cyclones, air spirals in toward the center in a counter-clockwise pattern in the northern hemisphere (clockwise in the southern hemisphere).

Cyclones

Centers of low pressure, the pressure decreases from the outer isobars toward the center.

Anticyclones

Centers of high pressures, the values of isobars increase from the outside toward the center.

After the direction from which they come

How are winds named?

El Nino

At irregular intervals of 3-7 years, these warm countercurrents become unusually strong and replace normally cold offshore waters with warm equatorial waters. Episodes of ocean warming that affect the eastern tropical Pacific.

La Nina

When surface temperatures in the eastern Pacific are colder than average.

classified by overall temperature and from the surface over which they form

Air masses that affect the US?

A cold front has blue triangles, and a warm front as red semi circles

How to identify cold and warm fronts on a weather map?

Cold front

It forms when cold dense air moves into a region occupied by warmer air. thunderstorms and heavy rain.

Warm fronts

It forms when warm air moves into an area formerly occupied by cooler air. Warmer temperatures, light to moderate extended rain.

Cumulus stage

first stage of thunderstorm, air rises supplying warm, moist air to the cloud

Mature stage

second stage of a thunderstorm, heavy precipitation

Dissipating stage

last stage of a thunderstorm the cloud begins to evaporate

April-June

In which season are tornadoes the most prevalent?

It sinks, subsides

What happens to air in a cyclone?

Continental Polar (cP)

What air mass affects northern Canada?

subduction zone

the region where an oceanic plate sinks down into the asthenosphere at a convergent boundary, usually between continental and oceanic plates

Continental-continental convergence boundary

What kind of boundary created the Himalayas?

maritime

air mass is over the ocean

continental

over continents

tropical

named this if air mass is located in the southern hemisphere

polar

named this if air mass is located in the northern hemisphere

cyclone in the Northern Hemisphere

air flows inward and blows out counterclockwise

cyclone in the Southern Hemisphere

air flows inward and blows out clockwise

Air subsides in a

cyclone

How old is the material if it’s half life is 100 million years and it has 1/32 parent remaining?

500 million

Which air mass is responsible for nor’Easters?

Maritime polar