Earth’s Dynamic Lithosphere & Plate Tectonics – Geology | Physical Geography with Professor Patrich

This lecture introduces the basics of plate tectonics. Concepts from Alfred Wegener’s Theory of Continental Drift 1912, as well as looking at the fossil record, allows us to paint a broader picture of our continents past, present, and future. The Earth’s layers are defined, as well as the origin of the heat required to melt rock, and to fuel the convection currents that drive our tectonics.

Plate tectonics is a scientific theory describing the large-scale motion of the plates making up the 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. The geoscientific community accepted plate-tectonic theory after seafloor spreading was validated in the late 1950s and early 1960s.

The lithosphere, which is the rigid outermost shell of a planet (the crust and upper mantle), is broken into tectonic plates. The Earth’s lithosphere is composed of seven or eight major plates (depending on how they are defined) and many minor plates. Where the plates meet, their relative motion determines the type of boundary: convergent, divergent, or transform. Earthquakes, volcanic activity, mountain-building, and oceanic trench formation occur along these plate boundaries (or faults). The relative movement of the plates typically ranges from zero to 100 mm annually.

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