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Plate tectonics refers to how humongous slabs of solid rock glide over Earth s mantle, the layer just below the crust. These continental slabs shift, fracture and collide, causing earthquakes to occur, mountains to grow and oceans to form. Besides Earth, no other known planetary bodies have plate tectonics, the researchers said. It s likely that Earth has life because of plate tectonics, For instance, over time, rocks capture carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas that helps to warm Earth (although too much CO2 can lead to global warming), and plate tectonics ensures that these rocks eventually get dragged down and melted, and their CO2 is spewed out as gas through volcanoes, ....
Scientists Date Start of Plate Tectonics Using Ancient Minerals courthousenews.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from courthousenews.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
E-Mail IMAGE: Zircons studied by the research team, photographed using cathodoluminescence, a technique that allowed the team to visualize the interiors of the crystals using a specialized scanning electron microscope. Dark circles. view more Credit: Michael Ackerson, Smithsonian. Scientists led by Michael Ackerson, a research geologist at the Smithsonian s National Museum of Natural History, provide new evidence that modern plate tectonics, a defining feature of Earth and its unique ability to support life, emerged roughly 3.6 billion years ago. Earth is the only planet known to host complex life and that ability is partly predicated on another feature that makes the planet unique: plate tectonics. No other planetary bodies known to science have Earth s dynamic crust, which is split into continental plates that move, fracture and collide with each other over eons. Plate tectonics afford a connection between the chemical reactor of Earth s interior ....
May 14th, 2021, 11:00AM / BY Abigail Eisenstadt Zircons are the oldest minerals in the world and come in colors like the rich blue above. Researchers have now used these gemstones to identify when modern plate tectonics began. (Ken Larsen) Zircon minerals are the oldest-known Earth material. Some formed even before the planet s crust became the rigid continental plates that move according to modern plate tectonics. New research on ancient zircons suggests that Earth’s modern plate tectonics likely formed around 3.6 billion years ago. The paper, published in the journal Geochemical Perspective Letters, reveals how one of Earth’s defining geologic features likely formed and set the stage for the emergence of life. ....
James Gaines, Contributor (Inside Science) Scientists examining billions-of-years-old crystals from Australia say they ve uncovered new evidence that helps pin the start of plate tectonics at roughly 3.6 billion years ago. Plate tectonics is the process responsible for continental drift, most earthquakes and volcanoes, and potentially even the long-term habitability of the Earth (thanks to the process s role in regulating our atmosphere). It s also, as far as we know, unique to the Earth no other planet is known to have plate tectonics. But exactly how, when and why the young Earth started exhibiting plate tectonics is still unknown and answering this question is of top priority to geologists. ....