| Term | Definition |
|---|
| seismic waves | waves of energy that travel through the earth when an earthquake occurs |
| pressure | the result of a force pressing on an area |
| crust | the layer of rock that forms Earth's outer skin |
| basalt | a dark rock with a fine texture that is found most commonly in the ocean crust |
| granite | a rock that usually is a light color and coarse texture most commonly found in the continental crust |
| mantle | a layer of hot rock just below the crust |
| lithosphere | the rigid layer of rock that forms the uppermost part of the mantle and crust together |
| asthenosphere | the rubbery layer of rock found just beneath the lithosphere |
| outer core | the layer of molten metal that surrounds the inner core |
| inner core | the dense ball of solid metal in the center of the earth made of iron and nickel |
| radiation | the transfer of energy (or heat) through space |
| conduction | the transfer of heat within a material or between materials that are touching |
| convection | the transfer of heat by the movement of currents within a fluid |
| density | a measure of how much mass there is in a volume of a substance |
| convection current | the flow that transfers heat within a fluid (or in earth) |
| continental drift | the idea that the continents slowly moved over Earth's surface |
| Pangaea | the supercontinent formed when the continents had drifted together (thought of by Alfred Wegener) |
| fossil | any trace of an ancient organismthat has been preserved in rock |
| mid-ocean ridge | a vent or crack in the crust where molten material seeps through |
| sonar | a device that bounces off underwater objects and that records the echoes of these sound waves |
| sea-floor spreading | a process through which cooling molten material continually adds new material to the ocean floor |
| deep-ocean trench | the oceanic crust that slides under the continental crust and back into the mantle at a continental divide |
| subduction | the process by which ocean floor sinks beneath a deep-ocean trench |
| plate | the separate sections that the lithosphere is broken up into |
| scientific theory | a well-tested concept that explains a wide range of observations |
| plate tectonics | the theory that states that pieces of Earth's lithosphere are in slow constant motion, driven by convection currents in the mantle |
| fault | breaks in the Earth's crust where rocks have slipped past each other |
| divergent boundary | the place where two plates move apart, or diverge |
| rift valley | the deep valley that forms as a result of a divergent boundary |
| convergent boundary | the place where two plates come together, or converge |
| transform boundary | the place where two plates slip past each other, moving in opposite directions |
| 'lithos' (not included) | stone |
| 'asthenes' (not included) | weak |
| Alfred Weneger | the man who came up with the theory of Pangaea and continental drift |
| Harry Hess | the man who proposed the idea of sea-floor spreading and mid-ocean ridges |
| J. Tuzo Wilson | the man who proposed the idea of plates in the lithosphere |
| Andrija Mohorovicic | the man who discovered the 'moho' |
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