Chapter 2

Plate Tectonics
Tran Anh Tu, Dr.
Department of Earth Resources and Environment
Faculty of Geology and Petroleum, HCMUT.
trantu@hcmut.edu.vn, cell phone: +84-918410939

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 Contents
• Interior structure of the Earth
• Earth’s crust
• Continental drift evidences
• Earth's magnetic field and Paleomagnetism
– Geomagnetic reversals
• Sea floor spreading
• Tectonic plates
– Tectonic plate boundary
– Hot spot
– Driving forces of plate motion

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 Interior structure of the Earth
1. Inner core
2. Outer core
3. Lower mantle
4. Upper mantle
5. Lithosphere
6. Crust
Using these subfields:
-seismology,
-computer modeling,
-mineralogy and crystallography,
-Condition: high temperatures and pressures

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 Interior structure of the Earth (cont.’)
1. continental crust
2. oceanic crust
3. upper mantle
4. lower mantle
5. outer core
6. inner core
Discontinuity:
A. Mohorovičić
B. Gutenberg
C. Lehmann–Bullen
Lithosphere = crust +
upper most of upper
mantle
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 Earth’s Crust
• Continental crust • Oceanic crust
– Sediment – Sediment
– Granite – Basalt
– Basaltic rocks – Gabbro, ultramafic rock
– Up to 70km thickness – Up to 7-10km

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 Earth’s crust thickness

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 Continent shape

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 Continental drift evidences

Continuity of Precambrian rocks.

The immense periods of time over
which these Archaean and
Precambrian units were formed
(>2 Ga) indicate that South
America and Africa had together
formed a single land mass for a
considerable part of the Earth's
history. (Adapted from Hallam,
1975)

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 Continental drift evidences (cont.’)
Early Lizards were discovered in South America and South Africa.

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Mesosaurus skeleton, MacGregor, 1908.
 Continental drift evidences (cont.’)

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 Earth's magnetic field and Paleomagnetism
geomagnetic field, magnetic north and “true” north,

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 Geomagnetic reversals

* Magnetic minerals is cold down under Curie temperature,

magnetic polarity in mineral will parallel to Earth’s magnetic.

* Geomagnetic reversals are recorded in basaltic rock in the sea

floor as magnetic strips.

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 Sea floor spreading
• Before 1950, there is less information about sea
floor.
• During World war II, two importance discoveries
about sea floor:
- Mid-ocean ridge in Atlantic Ocean and
Eastern part of Pacific Ocean
- Ocean’s trench: surround continental edge
and Pacific Ocean.

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 • Sea floor spreading to form new oceanic crust. Will the
earth be expanded?
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 Tectonic Plates

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List 7 main tectonic plates 17
 Earthquake distribution

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 Tectonic plate boundary
• Divergent boundary
• Convergent boundary
• Transform boundary

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 Divergent boundary

20
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 convergent boundary

Subduction: continent
and oceanic crust

Volcanic arc

21
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 convergent boundary

Ryukyu island arc

Subduction: Oceanic -
oceanic crust

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 Convergent boundary
Continental Collisions
Euro-Asia collides Indian plate form Hymalayas

23
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 Transform Boundary

San Andreas Fault,

California is a example
one
24
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 Hot spot

Hot spots are volcanic regions thought to be

fed by underlying mantle that is anomalously
hot compared with the surrounding mantle.

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 Driving forces of plate motion
• Mantle convection

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 Review
The main features of plate tectonics are:
• The Earth's surface is covered by a series of crustal
plates.
• The ocean floors are continually moving, spreading
from the center, sinking at the edges, and being
regenerated.
• Convection currents beneath the plates move the
crustal plates in different directions.
• The source of heat driving the convection currents is
radioactivity deep in the Earths mantle.

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 Review
The Story of Plate Tectonic is a story of:
• continents drifting majestically from place to place
breaking apart, colliding, and grinding against each
other;
• of terrestrial mountain ranges rising up like rumples
in rugs being pushed together;
• of oceans opening and closing and undersea
mountain chains girdling the planet like seams on a
baseball;
• of violent earthquakes and fiery volcanoes.
Plate Tectonics describes the intricate design of a
complex, living planet in a state of dynamic flux.
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 Vocabulary
• Plate tectonic
• Lithosphere
• Mid-ocean ridge
• Mantle convection
• Convergent, divergent and transform boundaries
• Geomagnetic reversal
• Sea floor spreading
• Oceanic trench

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 Quiz
• Review and do quiz at
• http://wps.prenhall.com/esm_tarbuck_earth_
8/19/5071/1298319.cw/index.html

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 PRE-PANGEA

EARTH WHEN PLANT FOSSILS

of WEST VIRGINIA LIVED
Carboniferous Period
(Mississippian - Pennsylvanian)

(325 million years ago)

325 million years ago during the Carboniferous Period , North America
and Europe were converging to form the supercontinent Euramerica.
Part of Eastern Europe and most of northeast Asia were joined to form
the ancient continent Angra at this time.
During this period West Virginia was a tropical coastal swamp covered by
forests of primitive trees which lived, died, and accumulated to form thick
peat beds. Transformed by subsequent heat and pressure these beds
became the great bituminous coal deposits of North America and
Europe.

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 EARTH WHEN DINOSAURS
LIVED
PANGEA Triassic Period
(230 million years ago)

The first dinosaurs evolved during the

Triassic Period as all the continents
converged to form a single giant
supercontinent called Pangea.

• The resultant mountain range that emerged ran generally

east-west near 0 degrees latitude (equator) and may have
been one of the greatest mountain ranges the world has
seen, subsequent continental movements and complete
erosion have since obliterated all traces of it's highlands.
Today, we know of it from remnants of it's exposed roots
and from the vast sheets of sediments deposited in deltas
along it's margins.
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 The Jurassic Period followed (213 million
years ago) marked by the onset of sea floor
spreading which caused a dramatic
resurgence in continental drift, culminating in
the gradual breakup of the supercontinent.
This process continues today.

Along a line appoximating the location of the Equator, North America and
Eurasia split away from South America and Africa.
Later, South America separated from Africa and finally North America
separated from Eurasia.
The expanse of the Atlantic Ocean as we know it today represents the
distance of relative plate separation resulting from the relentless forces
of continental drift since that time. The place of origin of this rift is
marked by the present-day Mid Atlantic Ridge, part of a 24,000 mile
chain of underwater mountains that marks the zone along which the
earth splits and pulls apart as oceanic crust is created -- and is where
continental drift begins.

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 EARTH WHEN DINOSAURS
BECAME EXTINCT
End of the Cretaceous Period
(65 million years ago)
POST-PANGEA

By the end of the Cretaceous

Period the dinosaurs had all but
vanished from the face of the earth

South America and Africa split into separate continents, creating an

ever-widening Atlantic Ocean as they drifted apart.
North America and Europe were still joined to each other near the
Arctic Circle, but not for long. India split from Africa and assumed a
collision course with China.

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