Cht 3 key term

Question 1

Geosphere

Answer 1

The geosphere includes all the rocks that make up Earth, from the partially melted rock under the crust, to ancient, towering mountains, to grains of sand on a beach. Both the geosphere and hydrosphere provide the habitat for the biosphere, a global ecosystem that encompasses all the living things on Earth.

Question 2

Hydrosphere

Answer 2

all the waters on the earth’s surface, such as lakes and seas, and sometimes including water over the earth’s surface, such as clouds.

Question 3

Crust

Answer 3

In geology, a crust is the outermost layer of a planet. The crust of the Earth is composed of a great variety of igneous, metamorphic, and sedimentary rocks. The crust is underlain by the mantle. The upper part of the mantle is composed mostly of peridotite, a rock denser than rocks common in the overlying crust.

Question 4

Mantle

Answer 4

The mantle is the thick layer of hot, solid rock between the Earth’s crust and the molten iron core. It makes up the bulk of the Earth, accounting for two-thirds of the planet’s mass. The mantle starts about 30 kilometers down and is about 2,900 kilometers thick

Question 5

Core

Answer 5

Earth’s inner core is the innermost geologic layer of the planet Earth. It is primarily a solid ball with a radius of about 1,220 km (760 mi), which is about 20% of Earth’s radius or 70% of the Moon’s radius. There are no samples of Earth’s core accessible for direct measurement, as there are for Earth’s mantle.

Question 6

Lithosphere

Answer 6

the rigid outer part of the earth, consisting of the crust and upper mantle.

Question 7

Asthenosphere

Answer 7

the upper layer of the earth’s mantle, below the lithosphere, in which there is relatively low resistance to plastic flow and convection is thought to occur.

Question 8

Tectonic plate

Answer 8

Plate tectonics is a scientific theory describing the large-scale motion of the plates making up Earth’s lithosphere since tectonic processes began on Earth between 3.3 and 3.5 billion years ago. The model builds on the concept of continental drift, an idea developed during the first decades of the 20th century.

Question 9

Chemicals

Answer 9

A chemical substance is a form of matter having constant chemical composition and characteristic properties. Some references add that chemical substance cannot be separated into its constituent elements by physical separation methods, i.e., without breaking chemical bonds.

Question 10

Weathering

Answer 10

the process of wearing or being worn by long exposure to the atmosphere

Question 11

Erosion

Answer 11

the process of eroding or being eroded by wind, water, or other natural agents.

Question 12

Atmosphere

Answer 12

Earth’s atmosphere is composed of about 78 percent nitrogen, 21 percent oxygen, 0.9 percent argon, and 0.1 percent other gases. … Most of the water vapor in the atmosphere, along with dust and ash particles, are found in the troposphere—explaining why most of Earth’s clouds are located in this layer

Question 13

Troposphere

Answer 13

the lowest region of the atmosphere, extending from the earth’s surface to a height of about 3.7–6.2 miles (6–10 km), which is the lower boundary of the stratosphere.

Question 14

Stratosphere

Answer 14

The stratosphere extends from the top of the troposphere to about 50 km (31 miles) above the ground. The infamous ozone layer is found within the stratosphere. Ozone molecules in this layer absorb high-energy ultraviolet (UV) light from the Sun, converting the UV energy into heat.

Question 15

Ozone

Answer 15

Ozone, or trioxygen, is an inorganic molecule with the chemical formula O ₃. It is a pale blue gas with a distinctively pungent smell. It is an allotrope of oxygen that is much less stable than the diatomic allotrope O ₂, breaking down in the lower atmosphere to O ₂.

Question 16

Radiation

Answer 16

Radiation is energy that comes from a source and travels through space at the speed of light. This energy has an electric field and a magnetic field associated with it, and has wave-like properties. You could also call radiation “electromagnetic waves”

Question 17

Conduction

Answer 17

the process by which heat or electricity is directly transmitted through a substance when there is a difference of temperature or of electrical potential between adjoining regions, without movement of the material.

Question 18

Convection

Answer 18

the movement caused within a fluid by the tendency of hotter and therefore less dense material to rise, and colder, denser material to sink under the influence of gravity, which consequently results in transfer of heat.

Question 19

Greenhouses

Answer 19

The greenhouse effect is a natural process that warms the Earth’s surface. When the Sun’s energy reaches the Earth’s atmosphere, some of it is reflected back to space and the rest is absorbed and re-radiated by greenhouse gases.

Question 20

Water cycle

Answer 20

The water cycle shows the continuous movement of water within the Earth and atmosphere. … Liquid water evaporates into water vapor, condenses to form clouds, and precipitates back to earth in the form of rain and snow. Water in different phases moves through the atmosphere (transportation)

Question 21

Evaporation

Answer 21

Evaporation happens when a liquid turns into a gas. … When liquid water reaches a low enough temperature, it freezes and becomes a solid—ice. When solid water is exposed to enough heat, it will melt and return to a liquid. As that liquid water is further heated, it evaporates and becomes a gas—water vapor.

Question 22

Condensation

Answer 22

Condensation is the process where water vapor becomes liquid. It is the reverse of evaporation, where liquid water becomes a vapor. Condensation happens one of two ways: Either the air is cooled to its dew point or it becomes so saturated with water vapor that it cannot hold any more water.

Question 23

Precipitation

Answer 23

When we talk about precipitation, we are talking about water that is falling out of the sky, this could be rain, drizzle, snow, sleet, hail or something rarer!

Question 24

Salinity

Answer 24

The term “salinity” refers to the concentrations of salts in water or soils. Salinity can take three forms, classified by their causes: primary salinity (also called natural salinity); secondary salinity (also called dryland salinity), and tertiary salinity (also called irrigation salinity).

Question 25

Fresh water

Answer 25

Fresh water or freshwater is any naturally occurring liquid/solid water containing low concentrations of dissolved salts and other total dissolved solids. Although the term specifically excludes seawater and brackish water, it does include non-salty mineral-rich waters such as chalybeate springs.

Question 26

Biosphere

Answer 26

the regions of the surface, atmosphere, and hydrosphere of the earth (or analogous parts of other planets) occupied by living organisms.