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96 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
What are fossils? |
the preserved remains or traces of organisms that lived in the past |
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What does the study of fossils allow for? |
describe past environments and the history of life |
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What is the relative age of a rock? |
its age compared with the ages of other rocks |
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What forms of life evolved during the Cambrian Explosion? |
invertebrates that lived in the sea |
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Earth's earliest atmosphere lacked which gas that is necessary for life as we know it to exist today? |
oxygen |
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The climate in the center of Pangaea was probably |
hot, dry desert climate |
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What describes the climates of Europe and North American during the 1.8 million years of the Quaternary Period? |
a series of ice ages followed by periods when the glaciers melted |
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What is a petrified fossil? |
a fossil formed when minerals replace all or part of an organism |
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What is the age of an intrusion of igneous rock in relation to the sedimentary rock layers through which it passes? |
always younger |
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Originally, the geologic time scale placed Earth's rocks in order how? |
relative age |
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When did Earth's atmosphere, oceans, and continents form? |
Precambrian Time |
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What are animals that spend part of their lives in water? |
amphibians |
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What is stress that pushes a mass of rock in two opposite directions? |
shearing |
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The part of the fault that lies below the other parts |
footwall |
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In a strike-slip fault, the rocks on either side of the fault slip past each other sideways with little |
up-or-down motion |
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The type of stress force that produces reverse faults. |
Compression |
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The point beneath Earth's surface where rock breaks under stress and triggers and earth quake is called the |
focus |
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The type of seismic waves that arrive at the surface first and move by compressing and expanding the ground like an accordion are called |
P waves |
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The rating system that estimates the total energy released by an earthquake is called the |
moment magnitude scale |
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A force that acts on rock to change its shape or volume is called |
stress |
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S waves are also known as |
secondary waves |
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Compared to P waves and S waves, surface waves move |
slower |
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What scale would most likely be used to tell how much earthquake damage was done to homes and other buildings? |
Mercalli scale |
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The three major fossil fuels are coal, oil, and |
natural gas |
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Fossil fuels are considered nonrenewable resources because they |
take hundreds of millions of years to form |
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Wind energy is actually an indirect form of |
solar energy |
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In a nuclear power plant, what is used to change water into steam? |
heat released from nuclear fission reactions |
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What is efficiency? |
the percentage of energy that is actually used to perform work |
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Fossil fuels are energy-rich because they contain |
hydrocarbons |
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Coal is a solid fossil fuel formed from |
decaying plant remains |
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In one hour, Earth receives enough solar energy to satisfy the energy needs of the world for how long? |
a year |
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In which part of a nuclear power plan does nuclear fission occur? |
reactor vessel |
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One example of an energy-efficient device is a |
fluorescent light bulb |
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The most plentiful fossil fuel in the United States is |
coal |
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Which fossil fuel produces the lowest levels of most air pollutants? |
natural gas |
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Factories where crude oil is separated into fuels and other products are called |
refineries |
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What is the results of using fossil fuels more rapidly than they are formed? |
The reserves will eventually be used up |
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Which is an examples of a biomass fuel? |
wood |
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The intense heat from Earth's interior that warms the magma beneath Earth's surface is called what? |
geothermal energy |
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A layer of material that helps block the transfer of heat between the air inside and outside a building is called |
insulation |
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What erosion begins when runoff from rain fall flows in a thin layer over the land in a kind of erosion is called what? |
sheet erosion |
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The process by which natural forces move weathered rock and soil from one place to another is called |
erosion |
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Landslides, mudflows, slump, and creep are all examples of |
mass movement |
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A river flowing across a wide flood plain begins to form looplike bends called |
meanders |
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Deltas are built up by |
deposition |
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The process in which rock fragments freeze to the bottom of a glacier and then are carried away when the glacier moves is called |
plucking |
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The energy that produces ocean waves comes from |
wind blowing across the water's surface |
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The process by which wind removes surface materials is called |
deflation |
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a wide sloping deposit of sediment formed where a stream leaves a mountain range is called a |
alluvial |
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Which of the following is evidence that an area was once covered by a glacier? |
U-shaped valley |
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Mass movement is caused by |
gravity |
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Where a river flows from an area of harder rock to an area of softer rock, the softer rock may wear away, eventually forming a drop called a |
waterfall |
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After the last ice age, stranded ice blocks left behind by the continental glacier melted and formed |
kettles |
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A ridge of till located at the farthest point reached by a glacier is called a |
terminal moraine |
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If waves erode the soft rock along the based of a steep coast, the result may eventually be a landform called a |
wave-cu cliff |
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Wind carrying sand grains deposits the sand when the wind |
slows down or hits and obstacle |
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Particles of clay and silt eroded and deposited by the wind are called |
loess |
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In deserts, deflation can sometimes create an area of rock fragments called a |
desert pavement |
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According to Wegener's hypothesis of continental drift, |
the continents were once joined together in a single landmass |
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What is Pangaea? |
the name of the supercontinent that existed millions of years ago |
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Any trace of an ancient organism that has been preserved in rock is called a |
fossil |
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What technology did scientists use in the mid-1900s to map the mid-ocean ridge? |
sonar |
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In sea-floor spreading, molten material rises from the mantle and erupts |
along mid-ocean ridges |
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Old oceanic crust is more dense than new oceanic crust because it is |
cool |
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The geological theory that states that pieces of Earth's lithosphere are in constant, slow motion is the theory of |
plate tectonics |
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A place where two plates slip past each other, moving in opposite directions, is known as a |
transform boundary |
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A collision between two pieces of continental cruse at a converging boundary produces a |
mountain range |
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How did scientists discover that rocks farther away from the mid-ocean ridge were older than those near it? |
by determining the age of rock samples obtained by drilling on the sea floor |
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What did scientists in a submersible see when they observed the mid-ocean ridge? |
rocks formed by the rapid hardening of molten material |
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Mid-ocean ridges are |
found in all of Earth's oceans |
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The process by which the ocean floor sinks beneath a deep-ocean trench and back into the mantle is known as |
subduction |
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A rift valley forms as a |
divergent plate boundary |
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The place where two plates come together is known as a |
convergent boundary |
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Geologists infer from the rounded, eroded shapes of the Appalachian Mountains that |
the mountains have been eroding for millions of years |
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A marble statue is left exposed to the weather. Within a few years, the details on the statue have begun to weather away. This weathering probably is caused by |
carbonic acid in rainwater |
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Granite lasts a long time when it is used for building in areas where |
the climate is mostly cool and dry |
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The most important factors in determining the rate of weathering are |
rock type and climate |
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When earthworms add their wastes to the soil, then die and decay in the soil, they are contributing to the formation of |
humus |
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In a cross section of soil, the B horizon consists of |
clay, minerals, and little humus |
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Most of the work of mixing humus within the soil is done by |
earthworms |
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The type of soil called loam is made up of |
nearly equal amounts of silt, sand, and clay |
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What can cause the loss of soil that is not protected by plant cover? |
erosion by water or wind |
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Plowing removed the grass from the Great Plains and exposed the soil. What effect did this have when a drought struck the Great Plains during the 1930s? |
It helped to cause the Dust Bowl |
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What kid of weathering causes the mineral composition of rocks to change? |
chemical weathering |
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Frost wedging causes mechanical weathering of rock by means of |
freezing and thawing of water |
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The agent of mechanical weathering in which rock is worn away by the action of other rock particles is called |
abrasion |
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A hot and wet climate causes weathering to take place |
rapidly |
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A permeable rock weathers easily because it |
contains many small, connected airspaces |
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Soil formation begins with the weathering of |
bedrock |
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Soil that is rich in humus has high |
fertility |
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In which soil layer would you find loam that is rich in humus? |
A horizon |
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The texture or particle size of soil determines |
how much air and water the soil can hold |
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Living organisms in soil help to |
mix the soil and make humus |
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What term describes the management of soil to prevent its destruction? |
soil conservation |
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The practice of plowing fields along the curves of a slope is called |
contour plowing |
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In conservation plowing, why are dead weeds and stalks of the previous year's crop left in the ground? |
to retain moisture and hold the soil in place |