Seafloor Spreading Can Explain Magnetic Stripes Of The Ocean Floor

Evidence of sea floor spreading.

Seafloor spreading can explain magnetic stripes of the ocean floor.

Seafloor spreading processes create new oceanic crust at mid ocean ridges and destroy older crust at deep sea trenches. The theory of plate tectonics states that the lithosphere which is the earth s outer layer is divided up into a dozens of irregularly shaped plates. The discovery of magnetic stripes on the seafloor in the 1950s validated the plate tectonics theory for the geological community. Spreading rate is the rate at which an ocean basin widens due to seafloor spreading.

Because of these processes the ocean floor is renewed about every 200 million years. False the concept of seafloor spreading was supported by magnetic polarity stripes on the ocean floor. Several types of evidence supported hess s theory of sea floor spreading. Magnetic striping magnetic minerals are found in rocks.

The process of subduction and sea floor spreading can change the size and shape of the oceans. Such magnetic patterns led to recognition of the occurrence of sea floor spreading and they remain some of the strongest evidence for the theory of plate tectonics. The rate at which new oceanic lithosphere is added to each tectonic plate on either side of a mid ocean ridge is the spreading half rate and is equal to half of the spreading rate. This evidence led scientists to look again at wegener s hypothesis of continental drift.

This evidence was from the investigations of the molten material seafloor drilling radiometric age dating and fossil ages and the magnetic stripes. That is the time it takes for new rock to form at the mid ocean ridge move atoss the ocean and sink into a trench. The magnetism of mid ocean ridges helped scientists first identify the process of seafloor spreading in the early 20th century. Evidence for sea floor spreading.

When the earth s magnetic field reverses a new stripe with the new polarity begins. Basalt the once molten rock that makes up most new oceanic crust is a fairly magnetic substance and scientists began using magnetometers to measure the magnetism of the ocean floor in the 1950s what they discovered was that the magnetism of the ocean floor around. Eruptions of molten material magnetic stripes in the rock of the ocean floor and the ages of the rocks themselves. Magnetic polarity stripes give clues to seafloor ages and the importance of mid ocean ridges in the creation of oceanic crust.

The earth s magnetic field reverses in a regular pattern every few hundred thousand years. These two things were the magnetic striping on the ocean floor and the age of seafloor rocks. Spreading rates determine if the ridge is fast intermediate or slow.