Plate Boundaries Flashcards
What is the Earth broken up into?
Pieces called plates.
What creates convection currents?
Heat rising and falling inside the mantle create convection currents generated by radioactive decay in the core.
What do convection currents do?
Move the plates.
What happens when convection currents diverge near the Earth’s crust?
The plates move apart.
What happens when convection currents converge together?
Plates move towards each other.
What is plate tectonics?
The movement of the plates and the activity inside the Earth.
What do plate tectonics cause?
Earthquakes and volcanoes.
The point where two plates meet is called what?
A plate boundary.
Where are earthquakes and volcanoes most likely to occur?
On or near plate boundaries.
At what plate boundaries do plates move apart?
Tensional.
Constructive.
Divergent.
At what plate boundaries do plates move towards each other?
Compressional.
Destructive.
Convergent.
At what plate boundary do plates slide past each other?
Conservative .
Transform.
How do tectonic plates move?
1 - Tectonic plates float on top of the mantle and move around due to convection currents.
2 - The liquid rock in the mantle gets heated from the core.
3 - The warm material has more energy so it rises towards the surface.
4 - Eventually it cools down and material starts to sink as it has less energy than the warmer material around it.
5 - This up-down motion is called convection currents.
This layer is made form semi-molten rock.
Mantle.
This layer is made from the densest material on Earth.
Inner core.
