Chapter 6 Science Vocab Flashcards
Part of the upper mantle below the lithosphere that can flow and bend.
Asthenosphere
Circular current of warm material rising an cooling materials sinking that transfers heat.
Convection cell
Thicker, denser part of earths crust that makes up the continents.
Continental crust
Dense, metallic center of earth, consisting of the inner and outer core.
Core
Think, brittle part of earth that consists of continental and oceanic crust.
Crust
Rigid part of earth that consists of the crust and upper mantle, lying above the asthenosphere.
Lithosphere
Middle layer of earth, consisting of hot, solid rock.
Mantle
Metallic object from the early solar system that strikes earths surface from space.
Meteorite
Thinner, less dense part of earths crust that makes up the ocean basins.
Oceanic crust
Theory that earths lithosphere is divided into plates that move over the asthenosphere.
Plate tectonics
Earthquake wave that transports energy from an earthquake through the ground in all directions.
Seismic wave
Early 20th century hypothesis that the continents move over earths surface.
Continental drift
Area surrounding a magnet over which it exerts magnetic force.
Magnetic field
Device that uses sound waves to calculate distances to underwater objects and the sea floor.
Echo sounder
Hypothesis explaining how the ocean floor forms and how continents can drift.
Sea floor spreading
Deep crack in the ocean floor.
Trench
Splitting of a continent at a divergent plate boundary.
Continental rifting
Splitting of a continent at a divergent plate boundary.
Continental rifting
Location where two lithospheric plates come together.
Convergent plate boundary
Location where two lithospheric plates move apart.
Divergent plate boundary
Geologic activity that takes plates within a plate away from plate boundaries.
Intraplate activity
Line of island volcanoes resulting from of one oceanic plate beneath another oceanic plate.
Island arc
Slab of lithosphere that can move over earths surface.
Plate
Location where two lithospheric plates meet.
Plate boundary
Theory that earths surface is divided into lithospheric plates that move over the planets surface.
Plate tectonics
Sinking of one lithospheric plate beneath another.
Subduction
Area where two lithospheric plates come together and one sinks beneath the other.
Subduction zone
Fracture in rock where one plate slides last another.
Transform fault
Location where two lithospheric plates slide past one another in opposite directions.
Transform plate boundary
