Age Of Atlantic Ocean Floor

Therefore seafloor dating isn t that useful for studying plate motions beyond the cretaceous.

Age of atlantic ocean floor.

Because of this correlation between age and subduction potential very little ocean floor is older than 125 million years and almost none of it is older than 200 million years. The second largest ocean on earth the atlantic drives our weather patterns including hurricanes and is home to many species from sea turtles to dolphins. Relief of the ocean floor. Find the two black dots in the atlantic ocean.

It covers approximately 20 percent of earth s surface and about 29 percent of its water surface area. Because of this the youngest sea floor can be found along divergent boundaries such as the mid atlantic ocean ridge. Based on ages of the oldest rocks in the north and south atlantic describe how and when the atlantic ocean formed and how its shape has changed through time. Visualize how the atlantic ocean floor started separating the continents and grew to its present size.

The following features are shown at example depths to scale though each feature has a considerable range at which it may occur. 6 by knowing the age of the ocean floor and the distance from the ridge you can calculate plate motion along the mid atlantic ridge which is also the spreading rate. This feature though read more. The outstanding feature of the atlantic floor is the mid atlantic ridge an immense median mountain range extending throughout the length of the atlantic claiming the centre third of the ocean bed and reaching roughly 1 000 miles 1 600 km in breadth.

The dots are 5000 km apart and the green color of the ocean floor indicates that they are 100 million years old. The spreading however is generally not uniform causing linear features perpendicular to the divergent boundaries. It separates the old world from the new world the atlantic ocean occupies an elongated s shaped basin extending longitudinally between europe and africa to the east. The atlantic ocean is the second largest of the world s oceans with an area of about 106 460 000 km 2 41 100 000 sq mi.

This graphic shows several ocean floor features on a scale from 0 35 000 feet below sea level. Continental shelf 300 feet continental slope 300 10 000 feet abyssal plain 10 000 feet abyssal hill 3 000 feet up from the abyssal plain seamount 6 000 feet. The detail of such submarine terrain as continental slopes abyssal plains and the mighty mid atlantic ridge is stunning. For that geologists date and study continental crust.