what are tectonic plates made of and how hot are they?
In: Physics
They are giant slabs of rock floating on a magma ocean. They are very hot on the bottom because they are floating on magma. Whatever land you are standing on is the top of the plate so that’s not hot. In the Atlantic the plates are growing so the ocean is getting wider. Then you have areas where they are colliding and one plate has to slip under the other. This is how we get most earthquakes. Two plates smashing together is also how we get mountains. When India smashed into Asia we got the Himalayas. All these processes happen slowly over hundreds of millions of years. If you look at South America and Africa you can see they fit like puzzle pieces. Go on youtube and you can watch some videos.
Im no scientist but this is my understanding of how it works.
The bedrock under your feet is a shell around the world, but has cracked into gigantic “plates” that float on the ~~magma~~ underneath. They rub against each other, melt in some places and form in others.
Edit: The mantle is made of semi-viscous rock containing silicon, iron, magnesium, aluminum, oxygen and other minerals. Shout-out to internetboyfriend666.
As a expert on bird law and not tectonic plates, ima thinking they are cool on top, hot elsewhere like a big Mac.
For perspective, tectonic plates move about as fast as your fingernails grow. Each time you clip them, you can think of how far the land beneath your feet has moved.
Tectonic plates are pieces of the Earth’s crust and upper mantle, and as such, they’re made of largely the same types of rocks and minerals found on the surface; largely rocks and minerals like feldspars and quartz, as well as various other metals and oxides. The temperature depends on the depth, and different plates have different depths, raging from a few kilometers to over 200 kilometers. Temperatures increase with depth, rising to about 1300°C at the point where the plates give way to the mantle, although it’s a gradual transition area and there isn’t a hard boundary.
Latest Answers