1. Pangaea
Pangaea or Pangea was a supercontinent that existed during the late Paleozoic and early Mesozoic eras. It assembled from earlier continental units approximately 335 million years ago, and it began to break apart about 175 million years ago. Pangea was surrounded by a global ocean called Panthalassa, and it was fully assembled by the Early Permian Period.
During the Early Permian, the north-western coastline of the ancient continent Gondwana (a paleocontinent that would eventually fragment to become South America, India, Africa, Australia, and Antarctica) collided with and joined the southern part of Euramerica (a paleocontinent made up of North America and southern Europe). With the fusion of the Angaran craton (the stable interior portion of a continent) of Siberia to that combined landmass during the middle of the Early Permian, the assembly of Pangea was complete. Cathaysia, a landmass comprising the former tectonic plates of North and South China, was not incorporated into Pangea. Rather, it formed a separate, much smaller, continent within the global ocean Panthalassa.
2. Why is it cooler on top of a mountain?
This is a reasonable doubt indeed, because when we climb up a mountain, though we are going towards the sun, it is still cooler up there on top. Why is it so? The air is always warmest near the Earth’s surface. This is because the sun heats the Earth, and the gives off heat that warms the air. The sun does not warm the atmosphere directly. For each 300 meters, the temperature drops by about two degree centigrade.
3. What is deepest part of ocean?
The Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench is the deepest known point in Earth’s oceans. In 2010 the United States Center for Coastal & Ocean Mapping measured the depth of the Challenger Deep at 10,994 meters (36,070 feet) below sea level with an estimated vertical accuracy of ± 40 meters.
4. Aurora
An aurora is a natural light display in the sky, predominantly seen in the high latitude regions (Aurora Borealis or the Northern Lights and Aurora Australis or the Southern Lights). The aurora is formed when charged particles emitted from the sun during a solar flare penetrate the earth’s magnetic shield and collide with atoms and molecules in our atmosphere. These collisions result in countless little bursts of light, called photons, which make up the aurora. Collisions with oxygen produce red and green auroras, while nitrogen produces the pink and purple colours.
5. Why carbon is referred as the wonder element?
Carbon is one whose atoms have an almost infinite capacity for uniting with each other in chains and rings and various other configurations, and for becoming linked with atoms of other substances. Indeed, the incredible diversity of living creatures from bacteria to the great blue whale is largely due to this capacity of carbon. The complex protein molecule has the carbon atoms as its basis, as have molecules of fat, carbohydrates, enzymes and vitamins. So, too, have enormous numbers of non-living things, for carbon is not necessarily a symbol of life.
6. Is the earth’s rotation slowing down?
Yes, it is, due to a transfer of Earth’s rotational momentum to the Moon’s orbital momentum as tidal friction slows the Earth’s rotation. That increase in the Moon’s speed is causing it to slowly recede from Earth (about 4 cm per year), increasing its orbital period and the length of a month as well.
7. What is distribution of water on earth?
The oceans are huge. About 70 percent of the planet is covered in ocean, and the average depth of the ocean is several thousand feet (about 1,000 meters). Ninety-eight percent of the water on the planet is in the oceans, and therefore is unusable for drinking because of the salt. About 2 percent of the planet’s water is fresh, but 1.6 percent of the planet’s water is locked up in the polar ice caps and glaciers. Another 0.36 percent is found underground in aquifers and wells. Only about 0.036 percent of the planet’s total water supply is found in lakes and rivers. That’s still thousands of trillions of gallons, but it’s a very small amount compared to all the water available.
8. What is the smell of Rain?
The fresh aroma after a summer downpour is one of life’s pleasing scents. The earthy fragrance was named ‘Petrichor’ by Australian researchers in 1964. They described it as a combination of plant oils and the chemical compound geosmin which are released from the soil when it rains. No Perfume company claimed the same smell of their product yet.
9. Where does the oxygen we breathe come from?
Gaseous oxygen was created on the Earth about 3.5 billion years ago. At that time, the UV light of the sun decomposed the water vapour molecules present in the atmosphere, and released oxygen and hydrogen. But a major part of the oxygen immediately reacted with other substances, so that it was no longer available in the atmosphere as gas. Oxygen was also produced by the seas, where the ‘blue algae’ carried out photosynthesis. These bacteria converted sunlight and carbon dioxide into energy. In the process, gaseous oxygen was released as a ‘waste product’, which accumulated in the atmosphere. About one billion years ago, about one-twentieth (4%) of the atmosphere consisted of oxygen.
10. How long would it take you to run around the world?
Hence, Earth circumference is 2*Pi*r is about 40,030 km. Now is up to you to decide the amount of running per day. If you run a marathon 42.2 km per day, you’ll be done in around 2.5 years.
11. What is Moonbow? How is it different from rainbow?
A moonbow is a rainbow produced by moonlight rather than sunlight. Other than the difference in light source, its formation is exactly the same as for a solar rainbow: It is caused by the refraction of light in many water droplets, such as a rain shower or a waterfall, and is always positioned in the opposite part of the sky from the moon relative to the observer.
12. Why is the sunset red?
Red light has a longer wavelength than blue light.
This means that when the sun sets and is low on the horizon, the sunlight has to pass through more atmosphere than it does when the sun is directly overhead.
As the sun sets, we see red, orange and yellow light because the blue light has been filtered out by the thicker layer of atmosphere.
13. How Long Does It Take Sunlight to Reach the Earth?
In space, light travels at 300,000 kilometres (186,000 miles) per second. Even at this breakneck speed, covering the 150 million odd kilometres (93 million miles) between us and the Sun takes a considerable time. And eight minutes is still very little compared to the five and a half hours it takes for the Sun’s light to reach Pluto.
14. How old is the moon?
The scientific consensus is that the Earth’s moon formed four and half billion years ago. About 100 million years after the formation of the solar system, another small planet is likely to have collided with the Earth, resulting in the formation of the Moon.
15. How Much a Cloud Weighs?
A lot more than you think. They may look all light and fluffy, but the reality is that clouds are actually pretty heavy. Researchers have calculated that the average cumulus cloud – which is that nice, white fluffy kind you see on a sunny day – weighs an incredible 500,000kg (or 1.1 million pounds).