Earth's crust and upper mantle is divided into major plates and minor plates, sort of like pieces in a jigsaw puzzle. The major plates are the Eurasian Plate, Indo-Australian Plate, Pacific Plate, Nazca Plate, South American Plate, African Plate, North American Plate, Philippine Plate, Antarctic Plate, and Scotia Plate. The plates join together along plate boundaries.
The study of the formation and movement of lithospheric plates is called plate tectonics. Scientists have learned that the plates interact in three different ways at the plate boundaries: they can separate - that is, move apart (diverge); move toward each other (converge); or slide past one another.
Interactions at the plate boundaries cause earthquakes and volcanoes around the world. Earthquakes occur along fault lines and can occur along all the types of plate boundaries, including plates that are sliding past one another either in opposite directions or in the same direction at different rates. Volcanoes are located along converging plate boundaries and diverging plate boundaries. Geologists believe that some areas in Earth's interior are hotter than other areas. These hot spots melt rock, which is forced upward toward Earth's crust as magma to form volcanoes. The Hawaiian Islands sit on top of a hot spot beneath the Pacific Plate.
In this Virtual Lab, you will identify the locations of six earthquake epicenters and six volcanoes on a world map. Then you will compare these locations to the locations of plate boundaries. The epicenter of an earthquake is the point on Earth's surface directly above Earth's interior where earthquake energy is released. Keep in mind that the U.S. Geological Survey National Earthquake Information Center registered over 200,000 earthquakes during a recent 12-year period and that there are approximately 600 active volcanoes in the world today. Latitude and longitude are measurements in degrees (°) and minutes ( ' ), by which a location on Earth's surface can be precisely determined. Latitude is measured north or south of the equator. Longitude is measured east and west of the prime meridian, the designated zero meridian that passes through Greenwich, England.
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