Geology

____ waves are the fastest body waves generated by an earthquake

P

Precambrian refers to all the time before the start of the ____ Eon

Phanerozoic

Geologists learned that the outer core is liquid because ____ do not travel through the outer core

S waves

Which of the following describes a crystal?

a substance whose atoms are arranged in a regular, orderly, periodically repeated pattern

Beyond the Mid-Oceanic Ridge system are flat, level, featureless submarine surfaces called ____________________ ____________________

abyssal plans

If a series of island arcs collide with a continent over a long period of time, they add to a continent as:

accreted terranes

When two oceanic plates converge, the sinking plate drags the sea floor down to create:

an oceanic trench

An unconformity in which tectonic activity tilted older sedimentary rock layers before younger sediment accumulated is:

angular unconformity

A nonmetallic resource is:

any useful rock or mineral that is not a metal, such as salt, building stone, sand, or gravel

P, or primary, waves:

are characterized by alternate compression and expansion of rock

The ____________________ is the hot, weak, and plastic uppermost portion of the mantle

asthenosphere

The ____________________ is a mixture of gases, mostly nitrogen and oxygen.

atmosphere

A circular coral reef that forms a ring of island around a central lagoon is a/an ____________________

atoll

Most of the world's iron is mined from:

banded iron formations

Most of the oceanic crust is made up of ____________________, whereas most of the continental crust is composed of ____________________

basalt and granite

Oceanic crust is typically of ____ composition

basaltic

A pluton with an outcrop area of more than 100 square kilometers is a:

batholith

____ is formed as a residual deposit in warm climates.

bauxite

Tar sands are permeated with ____

bitumen

The color of ____ is caused by precipitation of fine-grained metal sulfide minerals

black smokers

Bioclastic sediment consists of:

broken shell fragments and similar remains of living organisms

A/An ____ is a crater formed by the collapse of a magma chamber

caldera

Mineral reserves:

can increase because new and inexpensive methods of processing lower grade ore can be developed and can become profitable if the price of the metal in a mineral deposit increases

____________________ is a principle that states that occasional huge catastrophes alter the course of Earth history.

catastrophism

Coal reserves are thought to be sufficient to last a few ____

centuries

Which physical properties distinguish a particular mineral from all others?

chemical composition and crystalline structure

Minerals are classified according to their:

chemical elements

At sea-floor vents, bacteria produce energy from hydrogen sulfide in a process called:

chemosynthesis

Sandstone, siltstone, and shale are ____ rocks.

clastic sedimentary

The tendency of some minerals to break along flat surfaces is called ____________________.

cleavage

As peat is buried and compacted by overlying sediment, it converts to ____________________.

coal

Layers of sedimentary rock are ____ if they were deposited without detectable interruption

conformable

Alfred Wegener proposed in his ____________________ ____________________ theory that Earth's continents were once joined together and later split and moved apart

continental drift

The Himalayan Mountain Range is an example of a ____ boundary

convergent

A tectonic plate is composed of:

cool, rigid rock that rides on a plastic mantle layer.

The geosphere consists of three major layers: the ____________________, ____________________, and ____________________.

core, crust, mantel

Matching rocks of similar ages from different localities is ____________________

correlation

Oceanic crust is ____ than continental crust and therefore ____ isostatically

denser; sinks

On the Mohs hardness scale, the hardest mineral is:

diamond

A/An ____________________ is an unconformity in which the sedimentary layers above and below the unconformity are parallel

disconformity

The San Andreas Fault zone is an example of a/an:

earthquake zone at a transform plate boundary

When solid rock deforms and returns to its original shape, it has undergone:

elastic deformation

The ____ is located on Earth's surface directly above the initial rupture point of an earthquake

epicenter

Pyroclastic bombs, cinders, and ash:

erupt explosively from volcanoes

The consequence of the vastness of geologic time is that:

events that occur slowly become significant

A feedback mechanism occurs when the environment initially changes slowly or not at all in response to a small perturbation, but after the threshold is crossed, an additional small perturbation causes rapid and dramatic change.

false

Fossil fuels are renewable

false

Oceanic crust is thicker than continental crust

false

Rocks and minerals in their natural state are never harmful to humans and other organisms.

false

The principle of ____________________ ____________________ states that species succeeded one another through time in a definite and recognizable order

faunal succession

A/An ____________________ ____________________ occurs when a small initial perturbation affects another component of the system, which amplifies the original effect.

feedback mechanism

Gentle eruptions of basaltic lava from long fissures create ___

flood basalts

A shield volcano commonly erupts when:

fluid basaltic magma builds a gently sloping mountain

The initial rupture point of an earthquake (below Earth's surface) is the ____

focus

Parallel growth of mica (and other minerals) during metamorphism and deformation of shales produces layering called ____________________

foliation

Fossil fuels are:

formed from the remains of plants and animals

A composite cone:

forms by repeated lava flows and pyroclastic eruptions over a long time

Petroleum, coal, and natural gas are called ____________________ ____________________ because they formed from the remains of plants and animals that lived in the geologic past.

fossil fuels

An example of a metamorphic change in which the new rock has a new texture, but the same minerals, is the transformation of ____ to ____.

limestone, marble

During the process of ____, soil loses its shear strength and becomes a fluid

liquefaction

The ____ includes Earth's crust and the uppermost strong and rigid part of the mantle

lithosphere

The rigid, outer part of Earth, including the crust and the uppermost mantle, is called the ____.

lithosphere

According to the theory of isostasy, the ____ is in floating equilibrium on the ___

lithosphere, asthenosphere

Granitic magma has a/an ____ melting temperature compared to basaltic magma

lower

The Mid-Oceanic Ridge is elevated above the surrounding sea floor because it is:

made of the newest, hottest, and lowest-density lithosphere

Extrusive igneous rocks form when:

magma erupts and solidifies on the Earth's surface

____ have occurred on average every 500,000 years over the past 65 million years of Earth's history

magnetic reversals

Remote sensing devices used to study the ocean floor are:

magnetometers; echo sounders; microwave radar instruments

The process by which rocks and minerals change in response to changing temperature, pressure, and/or chemical composition within the crust is ____________________

metamorphism

____________________ ____________________ is a mixture of clay carried from continents and the remains of tiny plants and animals that live in the surface waters of the oceans

pelagic sediment

Granite is an example of a/an ____ rock.

plutonic

Igneous rocks that solidify within the Earth's crust are ____________________.

plutonic; intrusive

The ____________________ encompasses approximately the first 4 billion years of Earth's history

precambrian

Evaporite deposits form by ____

precipitation from water

Melting caused by decreased pressure is called ____ melting

pressure-release

explosively erupted rock particles or magma form ____________________ rock

pyroclastic

Measurement of ____ age refers only to the order in which events occurred

relative

____________________ energy resources are replenished by natural processes as we use them

renewable

The same mineral that solidifies slowly to form granite can also erupt to form ____.

rhyolite

A mantle plume is a ____

rising column of hot, plastic mantle rock

At a divergent boundary between spreading tectonic plates in oceanic crust:

rock and magma rise to form the Mid-Oceanic Ridge

Weathering and erosion near the Earth's surface create the materials for ____ rocks.

sedimentary

About 5 percent of the Earth's crust is made of

sedimentary rocks

___ waves are elastic waves traveling through rock, produced by an earthquake

seismic

Feldspar is a/an ____ mineral.

silicate

Ninety-two percent of the Earth's crust is composed of ____________________ minerals.

silicate

Quartz is composed of ____.

silicon and oxygen

Igneous rocks form by

solidification of magma

Magma with a high water content has a greater tendency to ____ in the crust, compared with magma with a lower water content

solidify

Where two tectonic plates move past one another, rock near the plate boundary can stretch or compress elastically for decades, and then fracture suddenly and create an earthquake

true

A/An ____________________ is a sea wave generated by an underwater earthquake

tsunami

Submarine canyons on continental shelves and slopes are cut by ___

turbidity currents

At a transform boundary:

two plates slide horizontally past each other

____ means that the geologic processes operating today also worked in the past.

uniformitarianism

____________________ is a principle stating that the geologic processes operating today also operated in the past.

uniformitarianism

The major fuel in nuclear power plants is an isotope of ____

uranium

Water and air attack rocks at Earth's surface in a process called ____________________

weathering

Placer ore deposits form:

when streams or waves sort sediment according to density

An active continental margin forms:

where an oceanic plate sinks beneath a continental plate at a subduction zone

The three environments of magma production are ____________________ ____________________, ____________________ ____________________, and ____________________ ____________________

spreading centers, mantel plumes, and subduction zones

____________________ is the color of a fine powder of a mineral.

streak

Where two lithospheric plates of different densities converge, the denser one sinks into the mantle beneath the other in a process called ____

subduction

The Ring of Fire, a zone of concentrated volcanic activity encircling the Pacific Ocean basin, is located adjacent to ____

subduction zones

island arcs grow from ____

submarine volcanoes near a subduction zone

Earth's surface systems are ultimately powered by the ____.

sun

The fact that sedimentary rocks usually become younger from bottom to top is the principle of ____________________

superposition

Which one of the following is not a mineral?

synthetic diamond

A ____ is a combination of interacting components that form a complex whole.

system

A/An ____________________ is any combination of interrelated, interacting components.

system

The Earth's outer, cool, rigid shell is broken into several segments called ____________________ ____________________.

tectonic plates

Sand, silt, and clay that erodes from the continents and is carried to the deep sea floor is called ____

terrigenous sediment

____________________ defines the size, shape, and arrangement of igneous mineral grains in a rock

texture

a mineral is

the building blocks of rocks; a naturally occurring inorganic solid with a characteristic chemical composition and a crystalline structure; natural gems

The likely source of the Earth's magnetism is:

the flow of liquid metals in the outer core

The fundamental source of energy that drives Earth's surface systems¾the atmosphere, hydrosphere, and biosphere¾is:

the sun

The half-life of a radioactive isotope is:

the time it takes for half the atoms of the radioactive isotope in one sample to decay

Geologists use radioactive elements in rocks mainly to identify:

their absolute age

Imagine that a system has been perturbed at a constant rate for a long time, but the system has barely changed. Suddenly, a small additional perturbation causes a large change in the system. This scenario is an example of:

threshold effect

The San Andreas Fault is an example of a/an ____________________ plate boundary

transform

Where two plates move horizontally toward each other, they form a ____ boundary

transform

Which of the following tectonic environments does not generate large quantities of magma?

transform boundaries

A continental shelf on a passive margin is usually a wide bathymetric feature

true

A single plate can carry both oceanic and continental crust

true

A solar cell produces electricity directly from sunlight

true

A tsunami, produced by an undersea earthquake, may travel at 750 kilometers per hour

true

All of Earth's spheres continuously exchange matter and energy.

true

An element cannot be broken into smaller substances by ordinary chemical processes.

true

At present, the Atlantic Ocean is growing, while the Pacific is shrinking

true

Basaltic magma forms at the Mid-Oceanic Ridge

true

Earthquakes can occur in plate interiors

true

Gold and silver are examples of native elements.

true

Most rock-forming minerals are silicates.

true

Some of the world's richest offshore petroleum reserves are found on continental shelves

true

The Earth's atmosphere acts as a blanket, retaining heat at night and dispersing direct solar heating during the day.

true

Liquid freshwater amounts to about ____ percent of Earth's total water.

.64

The part of oceanic crust made up of pelagic and terrigenous sediment is:

layer 1

The magma of andesite and diorite contains ____________________ silica than granite

less

The age of the oldest ocean floor is about ____ million years

200 million

Average oceanic crust is ____ kilometers thick, whereas average continental crust is ____ kilometers thick.

4 to 7; 20 to 40

Geologists estimate that Earth formed ____ years ago.

4.6 billion

The mantle makes up about ____ percent of the Earth's volume

80

Oceans contain ____ percent of the Earth's water.

97.5

The earliest forms of rocks have been found in the _____ Eon.

Archean

Gradualism states that:

geologic change occurs over long periods of time by a sequence of almost imperceptible events.

In a placer deposit, gold settles out first when the stream current slows down because:

gold is denser than any other mineral

Two ore minerals that are commonly comprised of pure metals and contain only a single element are native ____ and ____.

gold, silver

Continental crust is typically of ____ composition

granite

The most catastrophic volcanic explosions occur when ____ reaches the Earth's surface

granitic magma

A seismograph measures ____

ground vibrations

The outer 75 to 125 kilometers of the Earth, including both the crust and upper mantle, consists of:

hard, strong rock of the lithosphere

The Hawaiian Island chain is an example of a volcanic center at a/an ____________________ ____________________

hot spot

The ____________________ contains all of Earth's water.

hydrosphere

Metamorphic rock forms when:

igneous, sedimentary, or other metamorphic rocks change because of high temperature and/or pressure, or compositional changes, or are deformed during mountain building

To measure the distance from a recording station to an earthquake epicenter, geologists evaluate the ____ with a time-travel curve

interval between the arrival of S and P waves

The metallic core is composed of ____________________ and ___________________

iron; nickel

A synthetic diamond is not a true mineral because it ____.

is not formed by natural processes

____________________ are atoms of the same element that have the same number of protons but different numbers of neutrons

isotopes

A/An ____________________ is a naturally occurring inorganic solid with a characteristic chemical composition and a crystalline structure.

mineral

The ____ scale measures the total amount of energy released during an earthquake, based on the amount of movement and the fault surface area

moment magnitude

A magmatic intrusion cutting through sedimentary layers:

must be younger than these sedimentary layers

____ releases no sulfur when burned, has a higher net energy yield than other fossil fuels, and can be extracted and used without refining

natural gas

The atmosphere consists mainly of ____.

nitrogen and oxygen

____________________ is any rock sufficiently enriched in one or more minerals to be mined

ore

The principle of ____ states that most sediment is deposited as nearly horizontal beds

original horizontally

The two most abundant elements in Earth's crust are ____.

oxygen and silicon

Continental crust and oceanic crust firmly join together at a/an:

passive continental margin