EARTH

SCIENC
E
What is an Oceanic Basin?
▪is the largest depression of land
surface on Earth under an ocean.

Tectonic activities such as

seafloor spreading and
subduction shapes ocean basins.
Wilson Cycle
refers to the sequence of
events leading to the
formation, expansion,
contracting and eventual
elimination of ocean basins.
Evolution of Ocean Basin
Embryonic
- rift valley forms as
continent begins to split
Juvenile
- sea floor basalts begin
forming as continental
fragments diverge.
Mature
- broad ocean basin
widens, trenches
eventually develop and
subduction begins.
Declining
- subduction eliminates
much of the seafloor and
oceanic ridge.
Terminal
- last of the sea floor is
eliminated continents
collide forming a
continental mountain
chain.
Suturing
- the remnant ocean basin
is completely subducted.
 Oceanic basin landforms have
two main characteristics:
1) Ocean basin
▪ is a land that exists under
an ocean
2) It includes all
topographical features.
It is said that ocean basins are not
featureless earth surfaces.
Information about ocean basins was
gathered using the following
technologies:

seismic surveyor,
echo sounder,
side-scan sonar,
and the satellites that
measure the height of sea
surfaces.
Topographical features of the
ocean basins
Topographical features:
Continental shelf
▪It is a shallow gently sloping
part of the continental crust
that borders the continents.
▪It has an average depth of
130 meters.
Continental slope
▪the slope between the outer
edge of the continental shelf
and the deep ocean floor.

Average depth of 135 meters.

Both continental shelf and
continental slopes are
structurally part of the
continents, although they are
below the sea surface.
Submarine canyon
The V-shaped canyon that
cuts into the continental slope
to a depth of up to 1200
meters.
It cuts perpendicular to the
running direction of the
continental slope.
Continental rise
It is found at the base of the
continental slope.

The depth ranges from 2000

to 5000 meters deep
Abyssal plain
A plain is a broad area of relatively flat
land.
Abyssal plain
▪ is an underwater plain on
the deep ocean floor
There are five major ocean
basins
Pacific basin
Atlantic basin
Indian basin
Arctic basin
Southern basin
Atlantic Ocean Basin
The average depth of the
basin is 12,881 feet and the
deepest point is the Puerto
Rico Trench at 28,231 feet
below the water.
Indian Ocean Basin
The basin has an average
depth of 13,800 feet, and the
deepest point is 23,812 feet
below water in the Java
Trench.
Southern Ocean
▪Does not have a true ocean basin.
▪It surrounds the continent of
Antarctica and extends northward
to 60 degrees of latitude, where it
meets the Atlantic, Indian and
Pacific Oceans.
Arctic Ocean Basin
▪It has an average depth of
4,900 feet and the deepest
point is at 17,880 feet below
water.
Pacific Ocean Basin
▪is the largest oceanic basin in
the world.
▪It is also the deepest, with an
average depth of 14,042
feet.
The deepest point found
below sea level is the
Marianas Trench
The oldest ocean-floor rocks
are 190 million years old

the oldest continental rocks

are 3.8 billion (3800 million)
years old.
Scientists estimate that there
are approximately 10, 000
volcanoes on the ocean floor.
Plate Movements
 A tectonic plate
▪ is a large, rigid piece of the
earth’s lithosphere that moves
and interacts with other plates on
the Earth’s surface.
Major continental and oceanic
plates:
 Eurasian plate
 Australian-Indian plate
 North American plate
 South American plate
 South American plate
 African plate
Antarctic plate
Pacific plate
These plates can move
centimeters per year.
They can move at rates of up
to four inches (10
centimeters) per year, but
most move much slower.
There are three types of plate
movement:
converging,
diverging
or transversing against one
another.
Continental - continental
collisions
▪occur when two continental
plates collide and neither will
subduct beneath the other.
These collisions result in
mountain-building.
Oceanic and continental collision
▪The denser oceanic plate
subducts beneath the more
buoyant continental plate.
Oceanic - Oceanic convergence
▪a denser oceanic plate
subducts below a less dense
oceanic plate forming a trench
along the boundary.
STRATIFICATION OF ROCKS
This layering is caused by
different factors but can you
easily guess how long has
this rock or layers of rocks
existed?
How Layers of Rocks Are
Formed
 Nicholas Steno
▪ studied the relative
positions of sedimentary
rocks.
Methods to Determine the
Age of Stratified Rocks
relative dating
absolute dating.
Relative dating
▪is a method of arranging
geological events based
on the rock sequence.
cannot provide actual
numerical dates of rocks.
Absolute dating
▪is a method that gives an
actual date of the rock or
period of an event.
Principles of Relative Dating
Law of superposition
Law of original horizontality
Law of lateral continuity
Law of cross-cutting
relationship
Law of superposition
▪the top layer is younger
than the bottom layer.
Law of original horizontality
▪states that most sediments
were originally laid down
horizontally.
Because of the Law of Original Horizontality, we know
that sedimentary rocks that are not horizontal either were
formed in special ways or, more often, were moved from
their horizontal position by later events, such as tilting
during episodes of mountain building. Thus, many-layered
rocks are no longer horizontal.

Instead of the assumed horizontal layer formation of the

rocks, rocks are moved from their horizontal position
which leads us to another idea of the Law of Lateral
Continuity.
Law of lateral continuity
▪suggests that all rock
layers are laterally continuous
and may be broken up or
displaced by later events.
This can happen when a river or stream
erodes a portion of the rock layers.
This can also happen when faulting
occurs. Faulting causes displacement in
rock units.
Law of cross-cutting
relationship
Any geological feature that cuts
across or disrupts another
feature must be younger than
the feature that is disrupted.
Radiometric dating
▪is a method used to determine
the age of rocks by measuring
their radioactive decay.
Carbon-14 method
▪uses a radioactive isotope
carbon-14 which has a
half-life of 5730 years.
▪is used to date things that lived
within the last 50,000 years.
Uranium-Lead method
▪uses uranium-238, which has a
half-life of 4.5 billion years.
▪as it decays becomes Lead-206
▪can be used to date rocks that
are more than 10 million years
old.
GEOLOGIC TIME SCALE
The geologic time scale is the
“calendar” of events in
Earth’s history.
These periods are:
Age-( millions of years)
Epoch-( tens of millions of years)
Period- ( one hundred million years)
Era- ( several hundred million
years)
Eon- ( half a billion years or more)
The timescale is divided
into eons, each eon into
eras, each era into
periods, and each period
into epochs then age