Lithosphere

Structure of the Earth

• Earth is made up 3 layers
→ Core
→ Mantle
→ Crust (thinnest
layer)
• Lithosphere ; Solid outer
crust of the earth • Types of plate boundary
containing mantle and core → Divergent
→ Convergent
crust
→ Transform
• Lithosphere upper mantle 1. Divergent
→ Spreading ridges
• The Earth's crust is made ○ New material erupted to
of: fill the gap
○ Iceland
Continental Oceanic 2. Convergent
(granite) (basalt) ▪ 3 types of collision
thick thin ▪ Continent-continent
Less dense denser - Mountains
Mostly old Young ▪ Continent-oceanic
- Subduction
- Oceanic lithosphere
subducts under
Plate Tectonics continental
• Tectonic: deformation of - Oceanic lit heats and
the crust bcs of plate dehydrates as it
interaction. subsides
• Earth's crust is divided - The melt rises forming
into 12 major plates volcanism
(moving in various ▪ Ocean-ocean
directions) - One sink into the
mantle forming
• Plate motion causes them subduction zone
to collide, pull apart and
scrape against each other - S.Z bent towards ocean
floor called trench
• Made of rigid lithosphere - Trench have world's
• Plates of lithosphere move deepest parts of the
around bcs of hot mantle ocean
convection under it
3.Transform
▪ Plates slide past
each other
 • Plates of lithosphere move deepest parts of the
around bcs of hot mantle ocean
convection under it
3.Transform
▪ Plates slide past
each other

Volcano
• Volcanoes are mostly
formed by subduction,
rifting, and hotspot
• Volcanism is mostly
focused at plate margins
• Hotspot volcano = Hot
mantle plumes breaching
the surface in the middle
of a tectonic plate

Earthquakes
• At the boundaries between
plates, friction causes
them to stick together
• Built up energy will break
them = earthquake occur
• Both volcanoes and
earthquakes are closely
linked to the margins of
the tectonic plate.