One of the major discoveries in geology (and science in
general) in the last century is the processes by which areas
on the surface of the Earth move relative to each other. This is often called ‘plate tectonics’ or earlier ‘continental drift’. Ultimately these movements are driven by deeper movements within the Earth. They are related to CONVECTION (movement associated with the transfer of heat) within the MANTLE. The mantle is the layer of the Earth between 2,9000km depth and ~30km depth. It is made of olivine-rich rocks like peridotite, which gives it it’s distinctive green colour. These rocks are SOLID but they still flow. At the base heat is transferred from the iron-rich metallic core as it cools. As the material is heated it expands and becomes less dense causing it to rise. At the top (beneath the crust) material cools, becomes more dense and sinks down. The material can flow, and so convect, because it is hot. You can think of this is like the way wax can be deformed easily when hot, but will break when cold. The uppermost part of the mantle is too cold and too strong to convect and is called the LITHOSPHERE. Plate tectonics implies that the strong lithosphere acts like a rigid shell, which is broken into pieces called plates and these plates move relative to each other due to the forces applied by the convecting material beneath (The convecting part of the mantle is called the ASTHENOSPHERE). The figure on the left shows a numerical model of a convecting systems with similar properies to the Earth. The temperature is shown by the colour. You can see darker (colder) areas sinking and that the upper part gets much colder as it nears the surface. That is the transition from convection to conduction as the material becomes too cold to convect. In summary the forces applied by the convecting asthenosphere move around parts of the strong lithosphere above. It had been recognized that the contintents may be moving from the mid 19th century. Initially it was based on the observation that the shapes of the continents fitted together like jigsaw pieces. Many did not accept this as they thought that the movement of such large areas relative to each other was impossible. In the early 20th Century, it was also recognized that the types of rocks on either side of the Atlantic Ocean matched each other (So the same types of rocks are in both West Africa and Brazil. This also suggests they may once have been adjacent. Not only the rock types matched. The fossils found in them were also similar. This is a Mesosaurus found in South West Africa and in Brazil. It was a shallow water ambush predator like a crocodile- not something that would be able to swim across the Atlantic…. We can also use PALEOMAGNETIC evidence to track the movement of the continents. Magnetic minerals within igneous rocks line up with the Earth’s magnetic field as they form and cool. Because we know where they were originally pointing we can work out the relative movements between continents by looking at the different orientations of these minerals in rocks in different continents which formed at different ages. We can track how the arrangement evolved from a single super-contninent called Pangea through Gondwana-land and Laurasia to the current arrangement. The continents are still moving relative too each other. Plate tectonics holds that all the relative movement should take place along narrow plate boundaries, with the rest of the plates being rigid and undeforming. This figure shows the location of earthquakes in the Atlantic. These earthquakes are caused by the relative movement between the plates (more on this later). You can see they lie along a narrow band – the PLATE BOUNDARY. There are around 16 major plates (although there are many other smaller ‘microplates’ in more complex regions). They move relative to each other at rates of a few mm or cm per year. We can measure these movements using GPS. There are different types of plate boundaries depending on HOW the plates move relative to each other. In the Atlantic, South America and Africa (And Eurasia and North America) are moving AWAY from each other. This means you get a CONSTRUCTIVE or DIVERGENT plate boundary. As the plates move apart hot asthenosphere can get close to the surface. It melts and then cools to form new oceanic crust. This means that new oceanic crust is being created and the plates are getting bigger (so constructive). The hot material being so close to the surface leads to the ocean being shallower and you can recognize these plate boundaries because they form MID-OCEAN RIDGES. Because the plates are moving apart you expect to see NORMAL faulting. Unfortunately ‘PLATE TECTONICS’ is not the whole story. Earthquakes don’t always occur along narrow boundaries, but can be spread across broad regions. This is especially true in areas where two continental regions collide (a CONVERGENT boundary). The collision between India and Eurasia is the classic example. The red dots are earthquakes and they are spread across a broad regions thousands of kilometers wide. The broad deformation is because where two continents collide they shorten and crumple up creating a broad mountain range. This is a CONTINENTAL COLLISION Where there is a CONVERGENT BOUNDARY and one plate is oceanic it can be pushed down into the asthenosphere below and most of the deformation is taken up in a narrow band at the boundary. (This is a SUBDUCTION ZONE). Because the oceanic plate is pushed down into the Earth convergent boundaries are often called DESTRUCTIVE plate boundaries. Because the plates are moving apart you expect to see REVERSE faulting. You can also get transform boundaries where the two sides move horizontally past each other. The most famous of these is the San Andreas fault. You can see how the rivers have been deflected by the faulting. Divergent boundaries can also occur in the continents (not just the oceans). One of the best examples if the East African Rift which is a newly forming plate boundary which will separate Africa into two parts.