Journal Article

GEOLOGY'S BIGGEST MYSTERY: WHEN DID PLATE TECTONICS START?

Marshall, Michael

2024

نظرة عامة

The forces behind plate tectonics play a part in determining nearly everything about Earth, from its climate to the evolution of life. Since the early twenty-first century, geologists have been gathering data in search of answers as to when and how plate tectonics began. Hidden history Since the 1960s, geoscientists have recognized that Earth's outer shell - the lithosphere - is not one single solid piece, but a series of rocky plates that jostle against each other and gradually change position. When Earth formed 4.5 billion years ago, it was much hotter than today: the newborn Earth probably had a magma ocean ratherthan a solid surface, perhaps something similar to the planet 55 Cancri e, which has been studied by the James Webb Space Telescope. Some episodes of subduction might have been triggered by meteorite impacts, according to simulations of such strikes7.

• الناشر: Nature Publishing Group
• موضوع: Biological evolution / Earth / Earthquakes / Geologists / Geology / Lithosphere / Magma / Meteorite collisions / Meteorite impacts / Plate tectonics / Plates (tectonics) / Rocks / Solid surfaces / Space telescopes / Subduction (geology) / Tectonics