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2.7 Driving Mechanisms: Mantle Convecton and Plate Tectonics

Understand the forces that drive the movement of Earth’s plates.
Learn how scientists used evidence from rocks on the ocean floor to develop a new theory that could explain continental drift.
Understand why plate tectonics theory explains why most earthquakes and volcanoes are in certain patterns on the Earth.

Educator's Guide to Convection Jet Propulsion Laboratory
This page includes a brief discussion on convection and links to see photos or animations that demonstrate convection.

Some Unanswered Questions About Plate Tectonics USGS

	What drives the plates? This article aims to explain the connection between plate movement and convection.

Mantle Convection Movies California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California
This page shows animations on mantle convection and plate movement.

Plate Tectonics Animation Chris Scotese, University of Texas at Arlington

	See animations of the Earth, plate movement, and drifting continents.

Plate Tectonics: Animation USGS
This website is a moving Earth that showes plate boundries.

Savage Earth PBS

	Learn about subduction zones in this animation.

Animated Earth: Tectonic Plates and Plate Boundaries NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio
These animations show the locations of the plates and their boundaries in the earth's crust.

Chapter One
Nature of Science

Chapter Two
Large-Scale Forces that Change the Geosphere

2.1
Evidence, Models, and Explanation

2.2
Matter Within Systems

2.3
Using Models

2.4
Natural Hazards and Risks

2.5
Earthquakes and Volcanoes

2.6
Continental Drift

2.7
Mantle Convecton and Plate Tectonics

2.8
Mountain-
Building

Chapter Three
Surface Process that Change the Geosphere

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This project is supported, in part, by the National Science Foundation (grant no ESI-0095938). Any opinion, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.