EARTH SCIENCE : WEATHERING

● Weathering is the breaking down of rocks either mechanically or chemically.

● Mechanical weathering is the process where rocks physically break down
into smaller pieces.
○ Mechanical weathering occurs due to several factors such as
fluctuating temperatures and pressure and biological activity.
○ The process that involves the repeated cycles of freezing and thawing
of ice is called frost wedging.
○ When different minerals in rocks expand and contract due to sudden
changes in the temperature, heating and cooling occurs.
○ When seawater penetrates crevices in rocks and evaporates, salt
crystals tend to grow.
○ Biological activity is the process wherein activities of organisms such
as plants and animals may break rocks apart.
○ Unloading is the process in which thick layers of sediments overlying
deeply buried rocks are removed through erosion or uplift.
● Chemical weathering is the process wherein rocks break down due to
chemical reactions.
○ Dissolution occurs when a solid rock or mineral dissolves in a liquid
such as water.
○ The process wherein water reacts with a mineral to form a new
mineral is called hydrolysis.
○ Oxidation is a chemical combination of oxygen with a mineral to form a completely different
mineral. At least one of these elements has a higher ionic charge.
● Weathering of rocks is caused by numerous factors such as climate, surface area and
topographic relief, and rock composition.
EROSION
● Erosion is the movement of sediments and particles through the help of transporting media
such as glacial ice, water, and wind.
● Water erosion is a type of erosion where water carries the sediments to different bodies of
water such as rivers.
● There are different subtypes of water erosion: splash erosion, rill erosion, gully erosion, bank
erosion, and thermal erosion.
● Wind erosion happens when light materials, such as small rocks and pebbles, are carried by
the wind to different places
● Glacial erosion happens when a glacier, or a river of highly-compact ice, moves downhill due
to its own weight.
● Human activities such as soil erodibility, overgrazing, cutting of trees and removing
vegetation, and use of herbicides, and fuel oils, can accelerate the rate of soil erosion.
● There are measures or steps that you can take to lessen the amount and rate of soil erosion.
These include terracing, reducing farmland conversion, planting vegetation, applying organic
fertilizer, and building retaining walls.
MASS WASTING
● Mass wasting is the movement of sediments due mainly to gravity.
● Mass wasting is different from erosion because mass wasting does not need any transporting
medium such as wind, water, or glacial ice.
● Mass wasting can be categorized based on the rate of movement (rapid or slow), type of
movement (falling, sliding, or flowing), and the type of material involved (rock, soil, or debris).
SEDIMENTATION
● Sedimentation is the process of deposition once the sediments are transported.
● The properties of sediments are: sphericity, roundness, and sorting.
● The Wentworth Scale describes detrital or clastic sediments by assigning names to particular
size ranges.
● Siltation is a type of pollution that occurs when silt or clay dominates a body of water.
EARTH’S INTERNAL HEAT
● The internal heat of Earth fuels the planet’s dynamic processes including plate movements,
earthquakes, and volcanism.
● Earth’s internal heat is produced by residual heat (extraterrestrial impacts and gravitational
contraction) and radiogenic heat.
○ Extraterrestrial impacts- Great amount of kinetic energy is produced by the accreting objects
which were then converted to heat energy.
○ Gravitational contraction - The collapsed cloud of dust resulted in the conversion of
gravitational energy into heat energy.
○ Radiogenic heat - The process of radioactive decay produces heat as a byproduct.
● Earth’s thermal budget is the measure of the amount of heat that is released at the surface
and produced in the interior.

Magmatism: How Magma is Formed

● Magma is defined as molten rock material produced by partial melting of the mantle and
crust. It contains liquids, gases, crystals and rock fragments.
● Temperature increases with depth, which is called geothermal gradient.
● Decrease in pressure causes adiabatic decompression. As pressure is decreased, melting
temperatures of materials decrease.
● Volatiles are substances that evaporate easily and can exist in gaseous form in the surface of
Earth.
● Magmatism occurs along plate boundaries or margins and sometimes within the plate.
● Magmas are classified according to the ratio between the alkalis and silica content.
○ Tholeiitic magmas or tholeiites, are produced by large degree of melting. In settings where
plates diverge, tholeiites form as mid-ocean ridge basalts (MORB).
○ Calc-alkaline basalts form along convergent plate boundaries above subduction zones.
○ Alkaline basalts form from smaller degree of partial melting, which results in alkali-rich and
silica depleted magma of diverse compositions.
○ Carbonatites are the only magmas that are not produced by silicate source rock.
Volcanoes and Volcanism
● Volcanism is the process where magma rises to the surface of Earth as lava.
● A volcano is a hill or mountain where lava, pyroclastic materials, and gases erupt. It can form
along plate boundaries or within the plate.
○ In divergent plate boundaries, volcanism manifests as ridges or fissures where products of
decompression melting erupt.
○ Convergent plate boundaries host a large number of volcanoes. Lava flows and pyroclastic
materials make up these volcanoes.
● Lava flows may be classified as pahoehoe (pronounced as “pah-hoy-hoy”) and aa
(pronounced as ah-ah).
○ Pahoehoe has a smooth and ropy surface.
○ aa has jagged and angular corners.
Plutonism
● Plutonism theory states that rocks were formed from heat-driven processes.
● Neptunist theory of the origin of granites states that these rocks are the oldest precipitates
from a primordial sea.
● The term plutonic can be used to classify rocks which formed in the interior of Earth. This is
the opposite of volcanic rocks which form on the crust.
● They vary in sizes and shape and may be classified as discordant or concordant structures.
○ Discordant structures are those that cut across existing structures.
○ Concordant bodies are those that are injected parallel to features in the country rock such as
sedimentary beds.
● Batholiths are by far the largest intrusive igneous bodies with lengths of up to several
hundreds of kilometers and width of up to 100 kilometers.
ROCK FORMATION
● A rock is an aggregate of minerals or minerals, which may or may not contain organic matter.
● The rock cycle is a model that shows how each type of rock is formed from each other.
● The three types of rocks are igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic rocks.
○ Igneous rocks form from cooling magma or lava. It can be classified as intrusive or extrusive,
depending on where they cool down.
■ The size of crystals is strongly affected by the rate of cooling. Slow cooling results in the
formation of fewer and larger crystals. By contrast, fast cooling produces rocks with smaller
crystals.
■ Granitic igneous rocks are light-colored, while basaltic igneous rocks are dark-colored.
○ Sedimentary rock formation starts with weathering, which is the breakdown of rocks and
minerals into sediments through mechanical or chemical means.
■ Sediments are moved around by agents like gravity, water, and wind in a process called
erosion.
■ Sediments settle in depositional environments, where they are lithified and form sedimentary
rocks.
○ Metamorphic rocks are formed from pre-existing rocks, which have undergone changes in its
mineral content and texture.
■ Foliation refers to the sub-planar orientation of mineral grains or the layering found in the
rocks.
■ Metamorphic rocks can be classified as foliated, which have clear layers, and nonfoliated,
which have no defined layers.
What is Metamorphism?

● The protolith is the pre-existing rock that undergoes metamorphism.

● Metamorphism changes the texture and mineralogy of the protolith and involves processes
such as recrystallization, neocrystallization, phase change, pressure solution, and plastic
deformation.
● Recrystallization is the growth of mineral grains of pre-existing materials.
● Neocrystallization is the formation of new minerals from the pre-existing minerals.
● Phase change refers to the change in mineral structure but with the same chemical formula.
○ Minerals with the same chemical formula but different mineral structure are called
polymorphs of each other.
● Pressure solution takes place when minerals are dissolved in areas with high pressure and
recrystallize in other areas with low pressure.
● Plastic deformation occurs when mineral grains soften and deform at high temperatures.
Types of Metamorphism
● Metamorphic grade refers to the relative temperature and pressure conditions during the
formation of metamorphic rocks.
● Prograde metamorphism takes place when pressure and temperature are increased.
● Retrograde metamorphism takes place when pressure and temperature are decreased.
● Types of metamorphism include contact, burial, dynamic, regional, hydrothermal, and shock.
● Contact or thermal metamorphism occurs when heat is transferred from igneous intrusions
to nearby rocks.
● Burial metamorphism occurs when rocks are buried to depths of several hundred meters and
form new rocks due to the temperature increase.
● Dynamic metamorphism occurs when two bodies of rock slide past each other along faults,
where some rocks are heated and pulverized to form new rocks.
● Regional metamorphism occurs over large areas that experience stress, such as in convergent
boundaries, where one tectonic plate goes under another tectonic plate.
● Hydrothermal metamorphism takes place mostly along mid-ocean ridges, where ocean water
is heated by nearby magma to form hydrothermal fluids, which causes chemical reactions to
take place in rocks.
● Shock metamorphism takes place when a meteorite hits the surface of Earth and transfers a
lot of heat to the place of impact, causing rocks to change.

Factors Controlling Metamorphism

● The process of metamorphism is controlled by four factors─temperature, pressure,
chemically active fluids, and time.
● Temperature is affected by heat or thermal energy, which can come from two sources─from
igneous intrusions and from Earth’s geothermal gradient.
● The geothermal gradient of Earth is the rate of increase in temperature with increasing depth
from Earth’s surface.
● Pressure increases with depth, and it can be classified into two types─ uniform stress and
differential stress.
● Uniform stress or hydrostatic stress refers to pressure with equal amounts of force coming
from all directions.
● Differential stress refers to pressure that is unequal in different directions.
● Differential stress can either be a normal stress or a shear stress.
● Normal stress compresses objects from two opposing directions.
● Shear stress smears objects in the direction of the stress.
● Chemically active fluids enhance the rate of chemical reactions, which can alter the chemical
composition of rocks.
● Metasomatism is the change in the composition of rocks due to the addition or removal of
certain substances or elements.
● Metamorphic rocks that contain large crystals need time to form, usually on a scale of tens of
millions of years.
Overview of the Layers of Earth
● The compositional layers of Earth are crust, mantle, and core.
○ The crust is the outermost layer of Earth which is primarily composed of granitic and basaltic
igneous rocks. It can either be classified into 11 continental crust and oceanic crust.
○ The mantle is about 84% of Earth’s volume which is mainly composed of silicates.
○ The core is innermost layer of Earth which is mainly composed of iron and nickel.
● The mechanical layers of Earth are lithosphere, asthenosphere, mesosphere, outer core, and
inner core.
○ The lithosphere is the rigid outermost layer composed of crust and the uppermost mantle.
○ The asthenosphere is the plastic layer of the mantle which enables the movement of slabs in
the lithosphere.
○ The mesosphere is a semi-solid layer below the asthenosphere.
○ The outer core is the liquid innermost layer of Earth.
○ The inner core is the solid innermost layer of Earth.
Andrija Mohorovičić (1857-1936), a Croatian meteorologist, and seismologist was the first to
discover Earth’s interior. In 1909, using a seismograph, he found a seismic discontinuity during
a destructive earthquake in the Kulpa Valley in Croatia. He observed that certain seismic waves
produced anomalies upon moving towards Earth’s center. He noted that one type of wave
propagated at the different rate as it moves from one media to another. He then hypothesized
that different densities of rocks caused the waves to bend or refract and that a boundary
existed between the lighter crust and the denser mantle. This boundary was subsequently
called as the Mohorovičić discontinuity or simply Moho discontinuity which is located between
the mantle and the crust.
THE CRUST
● The crust is the outermost rocky layer of Earth which is mainly composed of granitic and
basaltic igneous rocks. It can be classified as a continental crust or oceanic crust.
● Continental crust is composed of granite wherein it can either be in the form of mountain
belts or stable interior
● Oceanic crust are composed of basaltic rocks and is denser than continental. There are three
parts of oceanic crust, namely: continental margin, deep ocean basin, and oceanic ridge.
● Lithosphere makes up the tectonic plates which is composed of the crust and the uppermost
mantle.
The Mantle
● Mantle makes up about 84% percent of Earth’s volume and is mainly composed of silicates.
● Mohorovičić discontinuity is the boundary between the crust and the mantle.
● Gutenberg discontinuity is located between the mantle and the core.
● Convection is the process of sinking cold material and rising hot material due to the
difference in density. Additionally, mantle convection is the process of movement of materials
in the mantle which is driven by heat from the core.
● Seismic waves, specifically the body waves, are used to differentiate the layers of the mantle
through the refraction of waves as it moves from two media of different density.
● Lithosphere is composed of the crust and the uppermost mantle.
● Asthenosphere is the plastic layer which enables the movement of lithosphere above it.
● Transition zone is a region where rocks undergo a complete change wherein the crystalline
structure of rocks changes.
● Mesosphere is a semi-solid region which is usually referred as the lower mantle.

The Core
● The core is the innermost layer of Earth which is mainly composed of iron and nickel.
● Outer core is the innermost liquid layer of Earth.
● Inner core is the innermost solid layer of Earth.
● Gutenberg discontinuity is the boundary between the mantle and the core.
● Lehmann discontinuity is located between the outer and inner core.