EARTH AND LIFE SCIENCE REVIEWER mantle, the temperatures range from

600 to 900 °C. In the lower mantle, the

temperature can reach over 4000 °C.
EARTH’S INTERNAL CONVECTION CURRENTS

THE CRUST
 The crust is a very thin layer that
measures between 0 and 60 km.
 The outermost layer of the Earth.
 The thick continental crust, about 32
km, makes up the land surface of the
Earth and is composed primarily of less
dense materials such as granite; SiAl
 The thin oceanic crust has a depth of
5–10 km and is made up of basalt which
is denser than granite; SiMa
 Convection currents carry heat
from the hot inner mantle to the
cooler outer mantle
 If the upper part of the mantle
cools down, it becomes part of
the crust
 Also, this process is responsible
for earthquakes and other
geological processes

THE MANTLE
 Mohorovicic Discontinuity
- the boundary that separates
the Earth’s crust and the upper
mantle.
 The thickest layer of the Earth,
spanning almost 2900 km and making
up 84% of the Earth’s volume.
 It contains magma. It is primarily solid
but behaves as a viscous liquid.
 Geothermal gradient, the increase in THE CORE
temperature with depth. In the upper  Gutenberg Discontinuity
 - The boundary between the
Earth’s lower mantle and the outer
core.
 The core is at the center of the Earth. In
this region, the temperature is
hotter than the mantle. It is divided into
two parts: the outer core and the
inner core.
 The liquid outer core is 2300 km
thick. It is composed primarily of iron
and nickel. Temperature is around
4000–5700 °C. High temperature
causes the outer core to undergo
convection and rotates faster than
the planet: Dynamo effect.

 The inner core is a solid ball with a

radius of 1220 km. Like the outer core,
the inner core is made up of iron and
nickel, but in solid form. The
temperature is quite high at around
7000 °C.

 Lehmann Discontinuity
- the boundary between the
outer and inner core

EXOGENIC PROCESS
  a continuum of processes –
Weathering-Mass Wasting-Erosion-
Transportation-Deposition
 these processes are carried through by
Geomorphic Agents: gravity, flowing
water (rivers), moving ice (glaciers),
waves and tides (oceans and lakes),
wind, plants, organisms, animals and
humans
1. Degradation Processes-Also called
Denudation Processes
a. Weathering
b. Mass Wasting
c. Erosion and Transportation
2. Aggradation Processes
a. Deposition – fluvial, eolian, glacial, coastal
 External processes that occur at or near
the surface of the Earth.
 Exogenic processes are part of the rock
cycle.
 They are responsible for transforming
rocks into sediments.
WEATHERING
 Physical and chemical disintegration
and degradation of rocks.
 In situ, no transportation involved
 Involves the mechanical or physical
disintegration and/or chemical
decomposition that fragments rock
masses into smaller components that
amass on-site, before being moved by
gravity or transported by other agents
 The processes begin in microscopic
spaces, cracks, joints, faults, fractures,
lava vesicles and other rock cavities
TYPES OF WEATHERING:
 Physical or Mechanical Weathering
- is the breaking up of rocks without
changing the rock’s mineral
composition.
- No change in chemical composition
of rocks
- Disintegration and decay of rocks
via weather elements: high
temperatures, extreme cold and
freeze-thaw cycles.
 FROST WEDGING
- Water that enters through the cracks
and empty spaces of rocks expands
when it freezes.
 INSOLATION/ THERMAL STRESS
- Resulted from continuous expansion
and contraction of rocks caused by
temperature change.
 ABRASION
- Wearing away of rocks by constant
collision of loose particles.
 UNLOADING/PRESSURE RELEASE
- Rocks brought to surface erode
away releasing confining pressure,
and allows the rock to expand, thus
exfoliating.
 SALT CRYSTALLIZATION/
HALOCLASTY
- Force exerted by salt crystals that
formed as water evaporates from
pore spaces or cracks in rocks.
 Chemical Weathering
- Chemical weathering or
decomposition, decomposes rocks
through chemical change in its
minerals.
- Often transforming them when
water interacts with minerals to
create various chemical
reactions.
- When rocks are chemically
changed, it can make them look
different.
 OXIDATION
- Oxygen dissolved in water
will oxidize some materials.
 Reddish-brown rust will appear
on the surface of iron-rich
minerals, which easily crumbles
and weakens the rocks,
corrosion.
- This process is known as
rusting.
- Many other metals oxidized and
hydrate to produce colored
deposits, such as chalcopyrite
(CuFeS2) forming copper oxide
or iron oxide.
 HYDROLYSIS
- Mineral hydration, is a form of
chemical weathering that
involves the attachment of H+
and OH- to the atoms and
molecules of minerals.
- It affects silicates and carbonate
minerals.
- The rock surface decomposes
by increasing the pH of solution
through the release of hydroxide
ions.
 CARBONATION
- Rainfall is acidic because atmospheric
carbon dioxide dissolves in water
producing weak carbonic acid.
- Carbon dioxide dissolved in water reacts
with carbonate rocks to create a soluble
product (calcium bicarbonate).
- Carbonation occurs in rocks that
contains CaCO3, such as limestone and
chalk.
- The process speeds up with decrease
in temperature; colder water holds
more dissolved carbon dioxide gas.
 Biological Weathering
- Plants and animals as agents
of weathering.
- Roots physically break or wedge
rock
- Lichens (algae and fungi living
as single unit), remove minerals
and weaken rock by releasing
acids
- Burrowing animals can move
rock fragments to the surface,
exposing the rock to more
intense chemical, physical, and
biological processes and so
indirectly enhancing the process
of rock weathering.
 FACTORS THAT AFFECT THE RATE
OF WEATHERING
- CLIMATE- areas that are cold
or dry tend to have low rates of
chemical weathering, mostly
physical.
- ROCK TYPE- minerals that
constitute the rocks has different
susceptibility to weathering.
- ROCK STRUCTURE- presence
of joints, folds, faults, cleavage
disintegrate faster.
- TOPOGRAPHY- weathering
happens in steep slope that on
a gentle ones.
- TIME- length of exposure,
determines the degree of
weathering.
EROSION AND DEPOSITION
 EROSION
- The incorporation and
transportation of materials by
a mobile agent such as water,
wind, or ice.
- Natural process
- Humans activities have
increased by 10-40 times the
rate of erosion globally.
- Excessive erosion causes
problems such as
desertification, land
degradation, and
sedimentation of waterways.
 AGENTS OF EROSION
WATER
 SPLASH EROSION
- Raindrops cause tiny particles
of soil to be detached and move
out.
 SHEET EROSION
- Uniform removal of soil in thin
layers by the forces of raindrops
and overland flow.
  GULLY EROSION
- The removal of soil along
drainage lines by surface water
runoff.
 VALLEY EROSION
- Continuous water flow alongside
land and move downward,
which deepens a valley.
 BANK EROSION
- The wearing away of the banks
of a stream or river. This is
distinguished from erosion of
the bed of the watercourse
WAVES
- Waves are classified based on
generation force: wind-generated
waves, tsunami, tides, storm surges,
and seiches.
- Coastal erosion
-Hydraulic action, when air in a joint,
suddenly compressed by a wave.
-Wave pounding, sheer energy of the
wave hitting the cliff or rock.
-Abrasion, scraping, mostly effective
and rapid way of shoreline erosion.
-Corrosion, dissolving of rock through
carbonic acid.
 SEA WAVES
- Sea caves result where an
easily eroded piece of rock is
removed
 SEA ARCH
- A sea arch happens when a sea
cave or two goes all the way
through.
 SEA STACKS
- If the arch collapses, the
seaward part is still there and is
a stack
- Sea stacks are erosional
remnants; with a cave cutting
through, it's a sea arch.
GLACIER
- Glacier is a moving body of ice on land
that moves downslope or outward from
an area of accumulation (Monroe et al.,
2007).
- Abrasion- debris in the basal ice
scrapes along the beds. It yields glacial
polish and glacial striations.
- Plucking- fractured bedrocks are
incorporated into the ice.
- Effects of glacial erosion varies
depending on: rate of movement,
thickness of the ice, and Nerodibility of
the surface.
WIND
- Wind forms by differences in pressure
due to differential heating of the
atmosphere.
- Wind carries dust, sand, and volcanic
ash from one point to another.
- Wind erodes by:
-Deflation, removal of loose, fine
particles at the surface.
-Abrasion, grinding action and
sandblasting.

GRAVITY
- Mass wasting, the downslope
movements of soil, rock, and regolith
under the direct influence of gravity
(Tarbuck et al., 2014).
- Mass wasting moves materials from
higher to lower elevations.
MASS WASTING
- The downslope movement of rock,
regolith, and soil under a direct influence
of gravity.
- slope movement or mass movement
TYPES OF MASS WASTING
 FALLS
- Involve a single rock or thousands of
rocks.
-Travel at a high rate of speed down a
very steep slope
-If the slope is vertical or overhung,
rock(s) will drop straight downward,
fragmenting when they hit the base of
the slope.
-Over time, this forms a body of angular
rubble called talus, a distinctive
transition from the steep slope to flatter
ground.
-Rock fall
- Simplest and most
obvious form of mass
wasting.
- Materials fall freely in the air.
-Occurs only in a very steep
cliff.
-Talus, resulting mound of
debris at the bottom of the fall.
- Rock Avalanche
- Type of fall usually forms when
a massive rock fall explodes
apart on contact with a slope.
-As this occurs, thousands of
rocks continue their flying
trajectories down slope, colliding
with each other and the slope
itself.
-Transitional mass wasting
event, changing from a pure
rock fall to something more like
a rapid flow of material as the
material moves further from the
base of a slope.
 SLIDES
-slides have in common is that the mass
of sediment/rock sticks together as a
coherent block as it travels down slope
along a tilted plane or surface of
weakness.
-Ultimately, as the moving slide mass
comes to a sudden stop, it may break
apart and continue down slope as a type
of flow.
- Rock Slide
-Due to pre-existing plane or
weakness within a slope. Such
planes of weakness are either
flat sedimentary surfaces,
planes of cleavage, or a fracture
within a body of rock.
- Slumps
-Force exerted by salt crystals
that formed as water evaporates
from pore spaces or cracks in
rocks.
 FLOW
- Of the three basic types of mass
wasting, flows are the most complex,
both in terms of how they originate and
how they move.
-Unlike slides, in which the material
sticks together as a coherent mass as it
moves down slope, flows are
characterized by internal movements
of individual grains (tiny like silt or
 sand up to large boulders and small
blocks of crust) within the flow itself.
-The internal flow movements of
individual grains can be fast and
chaotic if the flow originates from a
steep slope, or if it contains a lot of
water.
- Or, grain movements can be very slow
and somewhat predictable if the slope
surface is very gradual in its angle.
- Rock Avalanche
-As the avalanching rocks begin
to slow and lose energy, the
internal behavior of the mass
becomes more like a fluid. Mass
will slow down, and cease.
- Debris Flow
-Debris flows usually contain a
high water content which
enables them to travel at fairly
high velocity for some distance
from where they originated.
-Creep
-Slopes creep due to the
ORIGIN OF EARTH’S INTERNAL HEAT
expansion and contraction of
surface sediment, and the pull
of gravity.
ENDOGENIC PROCESS
- Unlike exogenic processes (destructive),
Endogenic Processes are seen to be
"building" & "transforming" process,
leading to the formation of lithospheric
plates, mountains, volcanoes, and new
layers of rocks.
 GEOTHERMAL GRADIENT
- It is the rate of increasing
temperature with respect to
increasing depth in Earth's
interior.
- This gradient is due to outward
heat flow from a hot interior.
- The depth has a directly
proportional relationship to
the temperature.
- Primary cause of "convection
current"
 CONVECTION CURRENT
- Convection carries heat to the
surface of the mantle much
faster than heating by
"conduction".
- A convecting mantle is an
essential feature of plate
tectonics, because the higher
rate of heat transfer is
necessary to keep the
asthenosphere weak.
 ACCRETIONARY HISTORY
- A lot of Earth’s heat is leftover
from when our planet formed
due to catastrophic accretionary
collision; the bombardment of
planetesimals heated Earth to a
molten state.
 GRAVITATIONAL
- The gravitational pull off the
planet towards its center is not
only vital to keep the materials
compacted, compressed but
also helps in adding pressure to
the molten substances.
 FRICTION
- Earth's Interior is on the
constant move due to
convection current; creating
heat as product of collision is
inevitable.
 RADIOACTIVITY
- Radioactivity contributes 44% to
the Earth's heat. Unstable or
radioactive like Uranium (U-235
&2 U-238), Potassium- 40 and
Thorium-232
 ISOSTASY
- The balance between gravity
and buoyancy on the Earth's
lithosphere, as it floats on the
asthenosphere.
- Changes in the lithosphere's
weight can cause it to rise or
sink.
o As mountains are eroded,
the area may rise (uplift)
o As sediments are deposited
at the mouth of a river, the
area may sink (subsidence)
- This causes the crust to bend,
and rock to deform.
 MAGMATISM
- The formation and movement of
magma under the Earth's
surface.
- It is a direct reflection of a
planet's internal thermal state
and its chemical and physical
constitution.
- Magmatism is closely linked to
tectonism, which itself is directly
linked to the larger-scale
process of thermal convection
within the mantle and core.
MAGMA
- Is a hot semi-solid molten material,
that can push through holes or cracks in
the crust, causing a volcanic eruption.
MAGMA IS FORMED:
- Magma can be characterized based on
its mineral composition: basaltic,
andesitic, or rhyolitic.
- Hot rocks begin to melt deep down
beneath the surface, different minerals
has different melting point.
- Magma formation is usually found in:
o Subduction zones
o Volcanoes
o Mid-ocean ridges
 VOLCANISM
- Volcanism is any of various
processes and phenomena
associated with the surficial
discharge of molten rock
(magma), pyroclastic fragments,
or hot water and steam,
including volcanoes, geysers,
and fumaroles.
WHY VOLCANOES ERUPT?
- The explosivity of an eruption depends
on the composition of the magma.
- A thin and runny magma, let gases
escape easily, magma flows out of the
volcano.
- If magma is thick and sticky, gases
cannot escape easily. Pressure builds
up until the gases escape violently and
explode.
 PLUTONISM
- is the process by which magma
rises through the crust and
crystallizes as an intrusive
igneous rock beneath the
Earth's surface. Pluton is a
generic word for any igneous
intrusive rock body.
PLUTONIC FORMATIONS
Vertical plutonic intrusions are called "dikes";
Horizontal intrusions are called "sills"
 METAMORPHISM
- Mineralogical and structural
adjustments of solid rocks to
physical and chemical
conditions differing from
those under which the rocks
originally formed (protolith).
Changes produced by surface
conditions such as compaction
are usually excluded. The most
important agents of
metamorphism include
temperature, pressure, and
fluids.
TYPES OF METAMORPHISM
 CONTACT METAMORPHISM
- Temperature-dominated
transformation, cause by
magma intrusions
Ex. Hornfels, Quartzite, Marble
 PRESSURE METAMORPHISM
- Occurs when sediments are
buried deep under the ground;
pressure is dominant and
temperature plays a smaller
role.
 REGIONAL METAMORPHISM
- Both heat and pressure play a
role. This is typically found in
mountain-building regions.