GEL 109 - Exam 1 Review Questions Solved Correctly Latest Version 2025

GEL 109 - Exam 1 Review Questions Solved Correctly Latest Version 2025 How is the rock cycle connected to plate tectonics? - Answers through the process of rock formation. What types of rocks form from the melting/cooling of the mantle under the oceanic plate? - Answers Igneous rocks The mantle rock changes phase from a solid to a liquid when ... ? What is this melted rock called? - Answers the pressure drops but the temperature remains the same; Magma Magma is _____ dense than the solid rock? - Answers Less the movement of the Earth's crust through convection currents that occur in the mantle. - Answers Plate tectonics occur where hot magma rises to the surface, pushing the plates apart. - Answers Divergent plate boundaries What are the principle subsystems of the Earth? - Answers the atmosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere, lithosphere, mantle, and core. Approximately how long ago did the Big Bang occur? - Answers 14 million years What is earth's outermost layer? - Answers the crust What is the crust divided into? - Answers continental and oceanic portions the crust and underlying solid upper mantle together are known as ...? - Answers the lithosphere Earth's core consists of ...? - Answers an outer liquid portion and an inner solid portion What are the three major rock groups? - Answers igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic result from the crystallization of magma or the consolidation of volcanic ejecta - Answers igneous rock typically formed by the consolidation of rock fragments, precipitation of mineral matter from solution, or compaction of plant or animal remains - Answers sedimentary rock result from the alteration of other rocks, usually beneath earth's surface, by heat, pressure, and chemically active fluids. - Answers metamorphic rock This principle holds that the laws of nature have been constant through time and that the same processes operating today operated in the past, although not necessarily at the same rates - Answers the principle of uniformitarianism Credited with developing the hypothesis of continental drift. - Answers Alfred Wegener long, steep-sided depressions on the seafloor near convergent plate boundaries where oceanic lithosphere is consumed by subduction - Answers oceanic trenches the upper layer of the earth's mantle, below the lithosphere, in which there is relatively low resistance to plastic flow and convection is thought to occur - Answers Asthenosphere the rapid expansion of matter from a state of extremely high density and temperature that according to current cosmological theories marked the origin of the universe. - Answers Big Bang The central or innermost portion of the Earth, lying below the mantle and probably consisting of iron and nickel. It is divided into a liquid outer portion, and a solid inner portion. - Answers Core the remains or impression of a prehistoric organism preserved in petrified form or as a mold or cast in rock. - Answers Fossil a system of chronological dating that relates geological strata to time. It is used to describe the timing and relationships of events that have occurred during Earth's history. - Answers Geologic time scale the science that deals with the earth's physical structure and substance, its history, and the processes that act on it. - Answers Geology a supposition or proposed explanation made on the basis of limited evidence as a starting point for further investigation - Answers hypothesis One of the four gas giant planets in the solar system, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune, which have very large masses and are farther from the sun than the terrestrial planets. Also called outer planet - Answers Jovian planet the rigid outer part of the earth, consisting of the crust and upper mantle. - Answers lithosphere the part of the earth between the core and the the crust; makes up nearly 80 percent of the Earth's total volume; made up of magma and rock. - Answers mantle arise from the transformation of existing rock types - Answers metamorphic rock he building blocks of rocks; a naturally occurring, inorganic, solid, crystalline substance which has a fixed structure and a chemical composition which is either fixed or which may vary within certain defined limits. - Answers mineral The process by which changes in the genetic composition of populations of organisms occur in response to environmental changes. - Answers organic evolution a massive, irregularly shaped slab of solid rock, generally composed of both continental and oceanic lithosphere - Answers plate the theory that the outer rigid layer of the earth (the lithosphere) is divided into a couple of dozen "plates" that move around across the earth's surface relative to each other, like slabs of ice on a lake. - Answers plate tectonic theory a natural substance, a solid aggregate of one or more minerals or mineraloids. - Answers rock an idealized cycle of processes undergone by rocks in the earth's crust, involving igneous intrusion, uplift, erosion, transportation, deposition as sedimentary rock, metamorphism, remelting, and further igneous intrusion. - Answers rock cycle principles and procedures for the systematic pursuit of knowledge involving the recognition and formulation of a problem, the collection of data through observation and experiment, and the formulation and testing of hypotheses. - Answers scientific method types of rock that are formed by the deposition and subsequent cementation of mineral or organic particles on the floor of oceans or other bodies of water at the Earth's surface - Answers sedimentary rocks our Solar System formed from a giant, swirling cloud of gas & dust and that our Solar System formed out of a nebula which collapsed under its own gravity. - Answers solar nebula theo