Introduction to Geology

Prepared by: Engr. Mark

 Geology
Geology is the science study of the earth. GEO =
Earth, LOGY = Study of Science.

• It deals with the study of Origin, age, interior

structure, and history of the earth.

• Evolution and modification of various surface

features like rivers, mountains, and lakes.

• Material makes up the earth.

Main and Allied Branch of Geology
 GEOLOGY
Geology, uses the scientific method to
explain natural aspects of the earth, for
example :

How mountains form?

How earthquake form?
WHO NEEDS GEOLOGY?
Geology, benefits to
everyone on this planet.

Radio, clothes, car exist

because of what geologists
have discovered about
earth.

Mankind might have survived an earthquake,

flood or other natural disaster because the
scientists (geologists) have learned about
these hazards.
Earth’s Resources
 GEOLOGY AND CIVIL ENGINEERING

Civil engineering works are all

carried out on or in the ground.
Ground properties & processes are
therefore significant
 GEOLOGY AND CIVIL ENGINEERING

To understand the principles of

geology in civil engineering
constructions AND avoid failures
GEOLOGY AND CIVIL ENGINEERING
 Facts about Geology

Geology plays an important role in the Geology plays a huge role in climate and
way your smartphone works the health of the environment

Geologists are earth historians

Geologists study things that we Geologists don’t just focus on earth—

sometimes take for granted, like water, their work expands to other planets,
how much there is and how we access it too
PHYSICAL
GEOLOGY
Concepts of Physical Geology

Earth visualised as a giant machine

driven by two engines, both are
Heat engines

Internal
External
Concepts of Physical Geology
Concepts of Physical Geology

Internal
Driven by heat
moving from the hot
interior of the earth
Internal
toward the cooler
exterior. Moving
plates and
earthquakes are
products of this heat
engine.
Concepts of Physical Geology
External
Driven by solar power.
Heat from the Sun
provides the energy for
External circulating the
atmosphere and oceans.
Water, especially from
the ocean, evaporates
because of solar heating.
Concepts of Physical Geology

Over long periods of Mountains originally raised by

time, moisture at the Earth’s internal force (internal
Earth’s surface hepls engine) are worn away by process of
rock disintegrate. external engine.
INTERNAL PROCESS : HOW EARTH’s
INTERNAL HEAT ENGINE WORKS

The Earth’s internal

heat engine works
because hot, bouyant
material deep within the
earth moves slowly
upward toward the cool
surface and cold, denser
material moves
downward.
Concept
As the water
immediately above the
fire gets hotter, it
expands, become less
dense (weigh become
less) and rises. Water at
the top will loses heat to
the air, cools, contracts,
becomes denser and
sinks.
CONVECTION IN EARTH
Concept

The upper portion of the

mantle is in contact with the
relatively cool crust while the
lower portion is in contact
with the hot outer core.
Obviously, a temperature
gradient must exist within the
mantle
Concept

The variation of mantle

density with temperature
produces the unstable
situation of denser (cooler)
material resting on top of less
dense (warmer) material.
Concept

Eventually, the cooler, denser

material begins to sink under
the action of gravity and the
warmer, less dense material
begins to rise.
Concept

The sinking material

gradually warms and becomes
less dense; eventually, it will
move laterally and begin to
rise again as subsequently
cooled material begins to sink.
This process is the familiar
one of convection.
CRUST

Two major types of crust are

Oceanic crust and Continental
crust.

The crust under the ocean is

much thinner. It is made of
rock that is somewhat denser
than the rock underlies the
continents.
CRUST
LITHOSPHERE

Uppermost part of the

mantle are relatively rigid.
This layer known as
lithosphere. lith means
“rock” in Greek.
AESTHENOSPHERE

Uppermost mantle
underlying the lithosphere,
called the asthenosphere, is
soft and therefore flows
more readily than the
underlying mantle. It
provides a “lubricating”
layer over which the
lithosphere moves (asthenos
means “weak” in Greek)
AESTHENOSPHERE

Where hot mantle material

wells upward, it will uplift
the lithosphere. Where the
lithosphere is coldest and
densest, it will sink down
through the asthenosphere
and into the deeper mantle.
TECTONIC FORCE

The forces generated inside

the earth called as Tectonic
Force, cause the
deformation of rock as well
as vertical and horizontal
movement of portions of the
earth’s crust.
PLATE TECTONICS
 INTRODUCTION

Plate tectonics regards the

lithosphere as broken plates
that are in motion.

The plates, which are much

like segments of the cracked
shell on a boiled egg.
 THEORY OF PLATE TECTONICS
Wegener, for example, believed that the
earth had only One large continent
called Pangaea 200 million years ago. He
The theory that has come to
believed that Pangaea broke into pieces
be known as continental
that slowly drifted
drift was not proposed until
the early twentieth century
(Taylor, 1910; Wegener,
1915).
THEORY OF PLATE TECTONICS
 THEORY OF PLATE TECTONICS

The basic hypothesis of

plate tectonics is that the
earth's surface consists of a
number of large, intact
blocks called plates, and
that these plates move with
respect to each other
There are three types of plate
boundaries: divergent boundary,
convergent boundary, and transform
boundary.
 THEORY OF PLATE TECTONICS

The earth's crust is divided

into six continental-sized
plates (African, American,
Antarctic, Australia-Indian,
Eurasian, and Pacific) and
about 14 of subcontinental
size (e.g., Caribbean, Cocos,
Nazca, Philippine, etc.).
PLATE BOUNDARIES
DIVERGENT PLATE BOUNDARIES

Although most divergent

boundaries present today
are located within oceanic
plates, a divergent
boundary typically
initiates within a
continent.
DIVERGENT PLATE BOUNDARIES

It begin when a split, or

rift in the continent or is
caused either by
extensional(stretching)
forces within the
continent or by upwelling
of hot asthenosphere
from the mantle below.
DIVERGENT PLATE BOUNDARIES

Underlying the new sea

floor is rock that has been
newly created by
underwater eruptions
and solidification of
magma in fissures. Rock
that form when magma
solidifies is IGNEOUS
ROCK.
DIVERGENT PLATE BOUNDARIES
Plates
move toward each other.

By accommodating the
addition of new sea floor
at divergent boundaries,
the destruction of old sea
floor at convergent
boundaries ensures the
Earth does not grow in
size.
DIVERGENT PLATE BOUNDARIES

Convergent boundaries
describe by the character
of the plates that are
involved: Ocean-
continent, Ocean-ocean
and Continent-continent.
OCEAN-CONTINENT
OCEAN-OCEAN
CONTINENT-CONTINENT
TRANSFORM BOUNDARIES

Occurs where two plates slide horizontally past each

other, rather than toward or away from each other.
THE ROCK CYCLE
THE ROCK CYCLE