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Earths Internal Structure
Earths Internal Structure
STRUCTURE
And processes
What Was Early Earth Like?
Describe what Earth was like right as the Solar
System was forming?
Why did earth get hot?
What do fluids do when they are hot?
At first there were no layers, where did they come
from?
Early Earth
Early Earth was homogeneous (uniform)
Composed of mostly silicates, iron and magnesium
oxides
Temperature increased because of:
Meteorite impacts
Gravitational Compression
Radioactive Decay
When Iron and Nickel melted everything changed.
Earth’s Differentiation
Differentiation = segregated into a series of
concentric layers of differing composition and
density
Molten iron and nickel
up to form mantle
and crust
Distinct Layers
Crust Lithosphere
Mantle Asthenosphere
Core Lower Mantle
Outer Core
Inner Core
Crust
2 types
Continental Crust 20km ~ 90km thick (12~56miles)
Density of 2.7g/cm3
Oceanic Crust 5km ~ 10km thick (3~6miles)
Density of 3g/cm3
If the earth were an inflated balloon, the crust
would be the skin!
What element do you think makes up most of the
crust?
Crust
Oxygen is the most common element in the crust!
Oxygen bonds
• Asthenosphere
– part of upper mantle
– behaves plastically
and slowly flows
Plate Tectonic Theory