New Zealand researchers have developed the clearest picture yet of what happens at the base of tectonic plates and how they move across Earth’s surface. For the first time, an international team of ...

Our planet has an outer layer made up of several plates, which move relative to one another. While we may take this knowledge for granted, this theory of plate tectonics was only formulated in the ...

Using information from inside the rocks on Earth’s surface, we have reconstructed the plate tectonics of the planet over the last 1.8 billion years. It is the first time Earth’s geological record has ...

Scientists have discovered a new layer of partly molten rock under the Earth's crust that might help settle a long-standing debate about how tectonic plates move. Researchers had previously identified ...

It's the first time Earth's geologic record — information found inside rocks — has been used to create an animation of this kind. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate ...

Researchers in China and Australia have created an animation that details Earth's tectonic movements over the past 1.8 billion years. In just over a minute, the video offers a mesmerizing look at how ...

Earth’s crust looks solid from the surface, but it is broken into a shifting mosaic of slabs that slowly rearrange oceans and continents. Understanding how those tectonic plates first formed is one of ...

Tectonic plates are massive slabs of solid rock that make up Earth’s outer layer, known as the lithosphere. These plates float on the semi-fluid layer beneath them called the asthenosphere. Earth’s ...

Scientists analyzing seismic data from southern Tibet discovered that the Indian tectonic plate is fragmenting as it subducts beneath the Eurasian plate, reshaping our understanding of the forces ...