theory of plate tectonics
INTRODUCTION
 Tectonics- large scale deformational
features of the crust
 Plate tectonics – Earth’s outer shell
divided into plates; Plates move &
change in size thru time
 Activity at plate boundaries
combines:
o Continental drift
o Sea-floor spreading
o Paleomagnetism
 Ideas:
o Continental drift- Alfred
Wegener
o Sea-floor spreading
o Paleomagnetism
EARLY CASE FOR CONTINENTAL
DRIFT-ALFRED WEGENER (F.B.
TAYLOR & H.H. BAKER)
 Continental coastlines fit together
– 1620 Sir Francis Bacon: Africa
and S. America
 Rocks & structures indicated that
continents joined – Pangea -
supercontinent of the late
Paleozoic. It was separated into
Laurasia & Gondwanaland
 Fossil evidence- Glossopteris &
Mesosaurus
 Late Paleozoic glaciation
 Skepticism about Continental Drift
– Problem of driving mechanism
CONTINENTAL DRIFT
 Alfred Wegener (1912)
 Pangaea ( All Earth)
 Evidences:
- Continents FIT together like the
pieces of a puzzle
- Fossils
- Rocks and structures
- Paleoclimate
EVIDENCE FOR CONTINENTAL
DRIFT REVISITED
 Fitting continents at continental
slope rather than shoreline- 1000m
depth
 Refined matches of rocks between
continents
 Isotopic ages support matches
 Glacial evidence
 Matches between Africa and South
America are particularly convincing
PALEOMAGNETISM
 Iron becomes magnetized below the
Curie Point (600oC)
 Magnetite and hematite aligns on
existing magnetic field
 Dip indicates old magnetic pole
position
 Apparent motion of north magnetic
pole through time
- Split in path
 - indicates continents split apart - Low heat flow
- Negative gravity anomalies
- Benioff zone earthquakes

SEA-FLOOR
SPREADING
 Magnetic
anomalies
- 1950’s detection of 10-50km
wide strips symmetrical about
ocean ridges
- Vine and Matthews: magnetic
reversals
 Sea-floor moves away from mid-
oceanic ridge
 Plunges beneath continent or island - Andesitic volcanism
arc- subduction (earthquake define  Age of sea floor
zone, Benioff zone) - Young age of sea floor rocks
 Plate movement rate of 1 to 20 (oldest 160 my)
cm/year, 5 cm/yr average - Implies youngest should be at
 Driving force ridges, oldest at trenches
- Mantle convection - Explains patterns of pelagic
- Ridge Push- Slab Pull forces sediment

EXPLANATIONS SEA-FLOOR HOW DO WE KNOW THAT

SPREADING PLATES MOVE?
 Mid-oceanic ridge  Marine magnetic anomalies
» Hot mantle rock beneath ridge  Vine-Matthew Hypothesis
- High heat flow - Anomalies
- Basalt eruptions - Reversals
» Rift valley - Normal and reverse polarity
» Shallow-focus earthquakes - Positive and negative anomalies
 Oceanic Trenches
 Measuring the rate of sea floor
spreading
 Predicting sea floor age
 Fracture Zones & Transform Faults
- Pattern of earthquakes at rides
and fracture zones
- Transform fault
 Measuring plate motion directly
- Use of satellites

PLATES AND PLATE MOTION

 Plate
- Entirely sea floor or continental
and oceanic
 Lithosphere
- Crust and uppermost mantle
- Thickness increases away from
ridge
 Asthenosphere
- Low seismic velocity zone
- Behaves plastically
 Interior of plates relatively inactive-
Cratons
 Activity along boundaries
 - Trenches (zone of subduction), 1. Pillow basalt
melanges (complex of shear 2. Sheeted dikes
rock), accretionary prism 3. Layered gabbro
(sedimentary and volcanic 4. Peridotites; layered
wedges separated by high angle
faults)
- e.g earthquakes, volcanoes,
young mountain belts
 Plate tectonics a unifying theory for
geology
 Boundaries
- Divergent
- Convergent ultramafic rocks
- Transform  Marine sediment covers continental
edges
HISTORY OF  Passive continental margin
CONTINENTAL
POSITIONS
 Pangea split up
200 m.y
 Continents in
motion for at least
2 billion years

DIVERGENT BOUNDARIES   During break-up of a continent

 Continuing divergence
- Widening Sea
- Mid-oceanic ridge system
(70,000 km in length; 30-35 km
wide; 1-2 km deep)
- New crust formed at mid-
oceanic ridge
o Ophiolite Sequence (top
to down)
- Rifting, basaltic eruptions
(Flood Basalts), uplifting
- Extension-normal faults, rift
valley (graben forms)
- Shallow focus earthquakes
 Continental crust separates
- Fault blocks along edges
- Oceanic crust created
- Rock salt may develop in rift
 East African Rift System – early ages
of rifting; continental rifting

RED SEA DRIFT

 Red sea
 Gulf of Eilat
 Dead sea
 Linear Sea CONVERGENT BOUNDARIES
 Plates move toward each other
 One plate overrides the other –
subduction zone

TRANSFORM BOUNDARIES
 Two plates slide past each other
 Usually between mid-oceanic ridge
segments
- Can also connect ridge and trench  Oceanic – oceanic convergence
or trench to trench - Oceanic trench – curved convex
 Origin of offset of ridges to subducting plate
 - Benioff zone (dipping 200-900;  Continental – Continental
convergence
- Two continents approach each
other and collide
o Sea floor sub ducted on
o one side
o Ocean becomes narrower
and narrower
o Continent wedged into
subduction zone but not
average 450) carried down it
- Magma generated at depth o Suture zone
o Andesitic volcanism - Crust thickened
o Batholith implacement o Two thrusts belts
- Island arc forms - Mountain belt in interior of
o Angle of subduction continent
determines distance of arc from
trench
- Accretionary wedge
- Trench migration in time
 Oceanic – Continental convergence
- Active continental margin
o Subduction of oceanic
lithosphere beneath
continental lithosphere
o Accretionary wedge & forearc
MOTION OF PLATE
basin
BOUNDARIES
- Magmatic-arc volcanoes &
plutons  Boundaries move as well as plates
- Crustal thickening and  Ridge crest may jump to a new
mountain belts position
- Regional metamorphism  Convergent boundaries can migrate
- Thrust faulting & folding on or jump
continental side  Transform boundaries can change
o Back arc basin position – San Andreas fault may
shift

PLATE SIZE
 104 km2 to 108 km2
 New sea floor added to trailing edge
of plate – example North American
plate growing at mid-Atlantic ridge
 Oceanic pate gets smaller as
continental plate overrides it –
Eastward moving Nazca plate
subducted beneath westward
moving South American Plate
INTRA-PLATE FEATURES
 Thermal Plumes
 Explains
- Yellowstone volcanism
- Hawaiian volcanism
- Aseismic ridges
- Distribution of volcanoes
o Basaltic at diverging
boundaries
o Andesitic at converging
boundaries
- Earthquake distribution
- Young mountain belts
- Sea floor
o Mid-oceanic ridge
o Oceanic trenches
o Fracture zones
WHAT CAUSES PLATE MOTIONS?
 Slab push-pull
 Convection in mantle
- Deep mantle convection
- Two – layer convection
- Convection a result of plate
motion
o Ridge push
o Slab pull
o Trench suction

ATTRACTIVENESS OF PLATE
TECTONICS THEORY
 Many of earth features explained
 Summary: