Search results
Earth's crust consists of slowly moving tectonic plates, which interact to produce mountain ranges, volcanoes, and earthquakes. Earth has a liquid outer core that generates a magnetosphere capable of deflecting most of the destructive solar winds and cosmic radiation.
Earth formed approximately 4.6 billion years ago from a disk of dust and gas orbiting the newly formed Sun. It formed via accretion, where planetesimals and other smaller rocky bodies collided and stuck, gradually growing into a planet. This process generated an enormous amount of heat, which caused early Earth to melt completely.
In between the outer core and crust is the mantle, the thickest layer. This hot, viscous mixture of molten rock is about 1,800 miles (2,900 kilometers) thick and has the consistency of caramel. The outermost layer, Earth's crust, goes about 19 miles (30 kilometers) deep on average on land.
4 dni temu · Earth, third planet from the Sun and the fifth largest planet in the solar system in terms of size and mass. Its single most outstanding feature is that its near-surface environments are the only places in the universe known to harbor life.
1 dzień temu · Earth’s outermost, rigid, rocky layer is called the crust. It is composed of low-density, easily melted rocks; the continental crust is predominantly granitic rock (see granite), while composition of the oceanic crust corresponds mainly to that of basalt and gabbro.
22 sie 2024 · The Earth’s outermost layer—its crust—is rocky and rigid. There are two kinds of crust: continental crust , and ocean crust . Continental crust is thicker, and predominantly felsic in composition, meaning that it contains minerals that are richer in silica.
The crust sits on the mantle, which takes up 80 percent of the planet's volume. The upper part of the mantle is rigid, while at greater depths the rock is partially melted at temperatures as high as 3,000 degrees Celsius. Finally, the center of Earth is called the core.
