Geology 10 Subjects to Know List

Marek Cichanski November 21, 2011

How to Use this List

The questions on this list are the things you need to know for the lecture tests and the nal exam. Look at this list often! Its a good idea to look at it as soon as you do your reading, to see which questions the book has just covered. Same with lecture - its a good idea to look at it during and after lecture, so that you can see which subjects weve been talking about! This list includes the vocabulary terms that you should know. They are in italics. Heres a really handy tipif you print this list, make notes in the margin to remind yourself which pages in the textbook and which pages in your notes have the answers to these questions! (To do this, it is handy to number the pages in your class notes! ) If youre using the index card method of studying for the tests, each one of these subjects could have one or more cards devoted to it. Note: The chapters may look a bit out of order in this list, because were going through them in a slightly dierent order than the book.

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2.1

Material for Test #1

Chapter 1: The Earth in Context

Make sure that you understand the nebular theory for the origin of the Earth. What is a nebula ? What is one made of? How did one of them turn into our solar system? (Geology at a Glance on p. 18, 19 has a good summary, and theres a Take-Home Message summarizing this theory.) Within the nebular theory, what were the steps that formed the Earth itself? What is dierentiation, and how does it relate to the Earths layers? How did the Moon form? Where did the water in the oceans come from? What are the two main types of stu that the Earth is made of? (Hint: Theres a Take-Home Message about this.) What are the major layers of the Earth? How are they dierent from each other? What is each one made of? Make sure you understand the dierence between the compositional and mechanical layersyou may have a concept sketch 1 about this in your notes. What is the importance of the mechanical layers for plate tectonics? Make sure that you the dierences betweenand can keep straight the crust, mantle, lithosphere, asthenosphere, lower mantle, outer core, and inner core. If you see a TV show that says The Earths crust is divided into several major plates , whats a little bit wrong (or at least incomplete) about this statement?

2.2

Chapter 3: Patterns in Nature: Minerals

What is the dierence between rocks and minerals ? We may have used an analogy in class. Whats the denition of a mineral? What are the two most important parts of the denition? Whats a crystal ? Does this denition overlap with part of the denition of a mineral? If so, how?
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i.e. a detailed, labeled drawingyoull be making these yourself on the tests.

How does the idea of having room to grow aect the shapes of crystals? What are euhedral and anhedral crystals? In lecture, we talked about evidence for the idea that crystals are made of atoms arranged in organized patterns. What was this evidence? (We may have done a lab exercise about the shapes of crystals, which helped to explain this.) What did we mean by the Law of Constancy of Interfacial Angles ? How was that related to the idea that crystals are made of atoms arranged in organized patterns? Basic Chemistry : This subject seems a lot more intimidating than it really is! If you havent had chemistry before, or if its been a long time, it might seem scary, but if you take it one step at a time, its do-able. Here are the things you want to feel really solid about. (Pages A1-A8 go over this stu, and there are some important denitions in Box 3.1on page 71): Make sure you understand the structure of the atom, and what all of the particles are. Also make sure you understand the dierences between them. Make sure youre clear on the denitions of an element, an ion, an isotope, and what chemical bonding is. How does ionic bonding work? How is covalent bonding dierent? We went through a pretty detailed explanation of why some atoms gain or lose electrons. How did this work? We probably used N a and Cl as examples, and also Ca and F , and maybe things like Al and O, too. Make sure you understand these examples. How did the column trick on the Periodic Table work? (Knowing this will save a lot of work.) Which column on the Periodic Table contains atoms that dont want to bond? Why? Why are these atoms snooty and stuck-up ? Which column on the Periodic Table contains atoms that have a hard time deciding whether to lose or gain electrons? For the purposes of our lecture tests, which choice did we say they usually make?2 Whats the dierence between a cation and an anion ? (We might or might not have used those exact terms in class, but they are dened in the Marshak textcheck the
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What does that have to do with the name of the geographic area in which De Anza is located?

index.) How are anions used to dene the dierent mineral classes ? Which mineral class is the most important one in the Earth? What is the basic building block of this mineral class? What is the building block itself made of, and how are the parts arranged? Why does it bond with other ions? Silicate structures : The textbook (and probably your lecture notes) describe ve main types of silicate structures. Know the dierence between each type, particularly the stu about how the silicon-oxygen tetrahedra (a.k.a. silicate tetrahedra) share corner oxygen atoms. In class, we may have discussed the dierence between the cleavage of pyroxene and amphibole how did this work? (Make sure you remember what the cleavage characteristics of pyroxene and amphibole look likethis is something to know from lab.) We may have discussed an imaginary test question, about the triple chain silicateshow did that work?

2.3

Interlude A: Rock Groups

Whats the denition of rock ? What are the two ways that the grains in a rock can hold together? What terms are used to describe rock thats held together in each of these ways? What do we call rock thats still attached to the Earths crust? Whats an outcrop ? What are the three major groups of rock? What are the dierences between them? (Hint: These three terms are some of our most basic geological terms, which well use over and over again.) Whats a hand specimen ? Whats a thin section ?

2.4

Chapter 4: Up From the Inferno: Magma and Igneous Rocks

(Note: Were going to go through this chapter in a slightly dierent order than Marshak wrote it. Well start with Section 4.7 on p. 104.) Make sure you understand the dierences between phaneritic, aphanitic, and porphyritic textures (see p. 106). Also make sure you understand what fragmental and glassy textures are. How does the rate of cooling aect the texture of 4

an igneous rock? (Well probably talk about this in a lot of detail in class.) Understand and be able to explain the classication system for igneous rocks shown on p. 107. We will probably draw this on the board during lecture, but the chart might be oriented a little dierently than it is on p. 107. If so, make sure that you can see how the two charts are really the same thing. (Now, we jump back to p. 92...) Whats the dierence between magma and lava ? Whats the dierence between intrusive and extrusive igneous rock? How did we dene the composition of igneous rock? Most importantly, how are F e, M g , and SiO2 used to dene mac, intermediate, and felsic? Make sure you understand (and can explain) the three ways that rocks partially melt inside the earth: Decompression melting Addition of volatiles (a.k.a. ux melting) Heat-transfer melting (Note: These melting mechanisms are great examples of the sorts of things that you might be asked to draw as a concept sketch on a test! Figures 4.3 and 4.4 are really useful here!) Know the dierences between various types of intrusions: pluton, batholith, dike, sill. Figures 4.9, 4.10, and Geology at a Glance on p. 105 do a nice job of explaining all of this stu visually.

2.5

Chapter 5: The Wrath of Vulcan: Volcanic Eruptions

Products of volcanic eruptions can come in three main forms - what are they? Whats the dierence between pahoehoe and aa ? Whats columnar jointing ? What are the dierent types of pyroclastic deposits, and why are pyroclastic ows so dangerous? Why wouldnt you want to be around to watch ignimbrite form?

What causes the dierent shapes (and in particular the dierent steepnesses ) of various types of volcanoes? Make sure that you could make a concept sketch of each of the following: Shield volcano Stratovolcano Rhyolite dome Cinder cone Caldera Will it ow or will it blow? (p. 120)Make sure you understand why some eruptions are eusive and others are explosive. What are the three main hazards due to eruptive materials? What are the six Other Hazards Related to Eruptions ? How can a volcano aect the Earths climate? Are there volcanoes on other planetary bodies? Whats an example of a really huge shield volcano somewhere in the solar system?

2.6

Things from Lab to know for Test #1

In addition to the lab quizzes that youll take in Weeks 5, 8, and 11, some of the facts and concepts from lab will be on the lecture tests and the nal exam. Heres the stu youll need to know from the Mineral I.D. lab: Whats an example of a common, light-colored mineral that doesnt have any cleavage? What do we call the type of fracture that it exhibits? What were the two minerals in the feldspar group? Were they hard or soft? What were the two minerals in the mica group? What was distinctive about their appearance and cleavage? Which mineral zzed when you put hydrochloric acid on it? Whats an example of a mineral thats softer than a ngernail?

 Whats a soft, reddish-brown, rust-colored mineral? (Hint: its an oxide mineral mentioned in the Marshak text. Its important because its our main source of iron.)

2.7

Interlude B: A Surface Veneer: Sediments and Soils

Having learned about one of the major groups of rocksigneous rockswere going to consider what happens to rocks when they get exposed at the Earths surface. Make sure you understand the dierence between physical weathering and chemical weathering. What are the six types of physical weathering described by Marshak? How does each one work? (Make sure you understand what joints are.) What are the four types of chemical weathering? How does physical weathering help chemical weathering? This is related to the question of how a rounded block of rock could form without being rolled or tumbled. Make sure to look closely at (and understand) Figures B.7 and B.8. (Hint: When I make a big deal out of gures in the textbook, its a good idea for your brain to immediately say Hey! Concept Sketch Alert!) We may have made a list of the leftovers of weathering in class. Make sure to know this list.

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3.1

Material for Test #2 starts here

Chapter 6: Pages of Earths Past: Sedimentary Rocks

Whats the dierence between cover and basement ?3 Marshak describes 4 classes of sedimentary rocks. What are they? (In class, we may lump the last 3 into one general category.) Make sure that you are very clear on what clasts are and what clastic means.
Fig. 6.1 explains this, and its a great example of one of Marshaks What a Geologist Sees drawings. I love these things! Whenever you look at a photograph in the textbook or in class, try to do a W.a.G.S. in your head!
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Whats a sedimentary basin ? (We may have talked about this in class before you encounter this term in the textbook.) What is lithication and how does it work? How are clastic sedimentary rocks classied? This includes knowing what the main types of clastic sedimentary rocks are: Breccia Conglomerate Sandstone Siltstone Shale / Mudstone What are two common biochemical rocks? Whats a common organic sedimentary rock that can be used as an energy source? What are some common chemical sedimentary rocks? Sedimentary structures : Oh man, I love these. You can probably tell, based on how much time and detail weve probably spent on them in class. Like anything involving sedimentary rocks, its all about doing detective work to gure out what sort of depositional environment the rocks originally formed in... We discussed several sedimentary structures in class. What were they? What information can you get from each one? In particular, make sure youre clear on the following: How does each sedimentary structure tell us about the up direction at the time of deposition? Is the up direction in an ancient sed. rock necessarily the same thing as the up direction today? Which structure tells us about the ow direction at the time of deposition? How does this work? Which sedimentary structure is usually a sign of deep-marine deposition? Which sedimentary structure is a good sign of terrestrial (i.e. on-land ) deposition?

3.2

A jump to Chapter 12: Riches in Rock: Energy and Mineral Resources

Well briey jump to Chapter 12 in order to talk about oil geology... What is the denition of a hydrocarbon ? What sorts of atoms are you guaranteed to nd in it? Theres a list of ve things that have to exist/happen just right in order for oil and/or natural gas to accumulatemake sure you understand all ve! Source rock What sort of rock typically makes a good source rock? What sorts of little things do the atoms in oil and gas come from? Reservoir rock Do oil and natural gas occur in caves or similar underground pools? Where do we really nd oil and natural gas? What sorts of rocks make good reservoir rocks? Seal rock Why is this important? What sorts of rocks make good seal rocks? Trap Why does the oil move upward instead of downward ? Box 12.1 on p. 327 does a great job of showing various traps.4 Maturation This term may not be used in the textbook, but we probably used it in class. What is the oil window ?
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Uh-oh! I just mentioned some great drawings! You know what that means!

3.3

Chapter 7: Metamorphism: A Process of Change

What are two main things that change when rock undergoes metamorphism? What factors cause metamorphism? (We probably dened three of them in class.) What is a protolith ? What do foliation and foliated texture mean? What is the dierence between contact metamorphism and regional metamorphism? (Your class notes will probably be particularly useful here.) Foliated metamorphic rocks: Make sure you know the characteristics of these rocks: Slate Phyllite Schist Gneiss Migmatite (Note that these rocks also represent the progressive metamorphism of shale.) What are some common nonfoliated metamorphic rocks? What is the protolith for quartzite, and for marble ? How does foliation form? (This is related to the dierence between conning pressure and directed pressure. These terms might not be in the textbook, but theyre probably in your class notes.) Where do we nd most of the outcrops of metamorphic rock? What does exhumation mean?

3.4

Interlude C: The Rock Cycle

The Rock Cycle is a summary of the idea that one kind of rock (igneous, sedimentary, or metamorphic) can change into another kind of rock. Make sure you understand (and could re-draw) the rock cycle as shown in Fig. C.1 on p. 195.

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3.5

Chapter 10: Deep Time: How Old is Old?

What is the principle of uniformitarianism ? What is the dierence between relative age and numerical age ? Make sure that you understand how the principles of relative dating (called the principles for dening relative age in the textbook) work: Original Horizontality Superposition Original Continuity (I may call this Concealed Stratication) Cross-Cutting Relationships Baked Contacts Inclusions Whats an unconformity ? The textbook denes three dierent types. You dont have to know these three names, but make sure you could identify an unconformity in a sketch or photograph, or be able to make a sketch of an unconformity. Figure 10.4 is a good example of this, and well probably discuss this exact same area in class. What do we mean by correlation ? How does the principle of fossil succession help us to correlate stratigraphic formations between one area and another? Youll want to know the Geologic Time Scale (also known as the Geologic Column ), but you dont have to know every little detail. Here are the parts you want to know (note that Ive written them with the youngest one at the top, just like a stratigraphic column : 1. Cenozoic (what are the dominant forms of life during this Era?) 2. How many millions of years ago was the transition from the Mesozoic to the Cenozoic? 3. Mesozoic (what were the dominant forms of life during this Era?) 4. How many millions of years ago was the transition from the Paleozoic to the Mesozoic? 5. Paleozoic (what were the dominant forms of life during this Era?) 11

6. Cambrian Period - note that this is the rst part of the Paleozoic. (What major event in the history of life occurred at the beginning of the Cambrian? 7. How many millions of years ago was the transition from the Precambrian to the Paleozoic? (This is the same as the beginning of the Cambrian) 8. Precambrian Eon (When did this begin? How old is the oldest fossil evidence for life on Earth?) 9. When did the Precambrian begin? (Hint: This is a number we learned at the beginning of the course.) Next we dealt with isotopic dating. This can be a tricky concept, especially because it has a little bit of math in it. Here are the basic ideas that you want to make sure you understand: 1. What do we mean by an isotope ? (Pages A-3 through A-5, near the end of the book, can be helpful to review these concepts.) 2. What does it mean to say that some isotopes of some elements are radioactive ? Whats radioactive decay ? 3. What do we mean by the closure temperature ? 4. Why does the closure temperature idea mean that we can only date igneous and metamorphic rocks, and not sedimentary rocks? 5. What do the terms parent isotope and daughter isotope mean? Which one changes into the other? 6. Make sure you understand how the number of parent isotopes remaining in a sample changes as time goes by. What is the half-life of a radioactive isotope? 7. Probably the trickiest part of the whole thing is to be able to solve the how old is this rock? type of problem. We probably went over a method that I p p , also known as total . Take some time and make sure you know called p+ d how this works. How does the sequence of magic fractions (e.g. 1, 1 , 1 , etc...) 2 4 p relate to p+d ? Although we cant directly date sedimentary rocks, we could use datable igneous and metamorphic rocks, along with the principles of relative dating, to indirectly bracket the ages of sedimentary rocks. Make sure you can understand how this is done. (Its a lot like the exercises you did in the relative dating lab, and Figure 10.15 in the textbook does a good job of illustrating this concept.) 12

3.6
3.6.1

Material from Lab to Know for Test #2

Lab on Rock Textures

You should know and understand all of the texture terms from the lab on Textures and Genesis of Rocks. These are all terms that youve encountered in the lecture and the textbook anyway, so the lab should be a way to reinforce these concepts. In addition to knowing what these terms mean, make sure you know what mode of origin is implied by each texture. Are there some textures that can have more than one mode of origin? Texture terms to know: Glassy Aphanitic Phaneritic Foliated Porphyritic Clastic Bioclastic Pyroclastic 3.6.2 Lab on Rock I.D.

This lab covered all three of the major groups of rocks. For Test #2, make sure that you know the names, textures, and modes of origin of the most common sedimentary rocks: Sandstone Shale Conglomerate Breccia Limestone

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 Dolomite Chert Rock salt For the nal, you should also know the names, textures, and modes of origin of the common igneous and metamorphic rocks that you saw in the lab: Granite Rhyolite Diorite Andesite Gabbro Basalt Peridotite Obsidian Pumice Volcanic Breccia Tu Schist Gneiss Serpentine (a.k.a. Serpentinite ) Marble 3.6.3 Lab on Geologic Time (Contact Relationships and Geologic History)

Make sure you can apply the principles of relative dating to gure out the geologic history of an area. You did this in the lab, and we probably did this on the blackboard in lecture, too, such as when we were discussing unconformities. The story of Siccar

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Point, Scotland was a good example of the kind of geohistory interpretation that you learned about in lab.

Material for Test #3 starts here

(Note that were doing Chapter 9 before Chapter 8.)

4.1

Chapter 9: Crags, Cracks, and Crumples: Crustal Deformation and Mountain Building

Whats an orogen ? What are the two main types of deformation ? Where would each one be found within the Earth? Whats the dierence between a joint and a fault ? What are the three types of forces (or, more accurately, stresses ) that occur in the earth? Do any of them seem to go along with certain types of plate boundaries? Now we get to a subject than can be a little bit complicated... the dierent types of faults: First, make sure that you understand the concepts of strike and dip. This is shown in Box 9.1 on p. 246, and I probably demonstrated this in class. (Understanding strike and dip can be dicult, because it involves 3-D visualization, which can be tricky for many people.) Then be able to explain the dierence between a dip-slip fault and a strike-slip fault. Next, be able to recognize and explain the dierence between the hanging wall and the footwall of a fault. Then, whats the relative motion between the hw and fw for a normal fault and for a reverse fault? And which of these faults is the result of crustal shortening, and which one is the result of crustal stretching ?

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 Whats the dierence between a right-lateral strike-slip fault and a left-lateral strike-slip fault? Does it matter which side of the fault you stand on?

4.2

Chapter 8: A Violent Pulse: Earthquakes

What is a fault ? Know the basic anatomy of an earthquakeFigure 8.2a will be helpful here, as well as any similar drawings in your class notes. What is the dierence between the hypocenter (which I may refer to as the focus in class) and the epicenter ? What are wave fronts and ray paths ? (Ill probably include these in some of the rst drawings that I make for this part of the class, but you wont encounter these terms in the textbook until Fig. 8.9a.) What does the magnitude of an earthquake mean? What are the things that cause an earthquake to have the magnitude that it does? (This may be laid out in your notes more than in the textbook.) How does a seismologist calculate the magnitude of an earthquake, using a seismogram? (YOU DID THIS IN LAB. Studying your seismology lab here would be a great idea!) What is the dierence between magnitude and intensity ? What scales are used to measure each one? What are aftershocks ? Make sure you understand the dierences between the four main types of seismic waves (P, S, Love, and Rayleigh ). How does a seismograph work, and how do the seismic waves appear on a seismogram ? It will probably be a good idea for you to carefully compare Fig. 8.8b with your class notes, and WITH YOUR SEISMOLOGY LAB. How can a seismologist use the seismograms from 3 recording stations to locate the epicenter of an earthquake? (Note: This can be a tricky concept to understand! Its not really that complicated, but its easy to get confused. Youll want to carefully study Fig. 8.9, and make sure that you understand the part of your class notes in which we talked about lag time. This is a key concept in seismology! Dont forget, YOU DID THIS IN LAB! Studying your seismology lab would be a great idea!) 16

(I may have made an analogy involving pizza-delivery vehicles that travel at dierent speeds.) What are ve major types of earthquake hazards? How does an earthquake cause a tsunami ?

4.3

Interlude D: Seeing Inside the Earth

What are the dierences between the ways that P- and S-waves go (or dont go) through solids and liquids? How does this tell us about the outer core and the inner core ? What are the P-wave and S-wave shadow zones ?

4.4
4.4.1

Material from Lab to Know for Test #3

Lab on Seismology (Seismology: The Instrumental Study of Earthquakes)

The lab on seismology gave you hands-on practice in several of the concepts that we discussed in lecture and which you read about in the textbook. Make sure that you noticed the places where I pointed this out in Section 4.2, above.

4.5

Chapter 2: The Way the Earth Works: Plate Tectonics

This is a BIG chapter - the details will be coming at you fast and furious! Make sure to take good notes, read the book carefully, and see me for help if youre confused! Its really important to keep all the details straight in this plate-tectonic business. What was Wegeners basic idea about the history of the continents? What was Pangea ? What was Wegners evidence for his idea? (There were several dierent lines of evidence. In class, we might have made an analogy to a newspaperif so, what is the analogy?) 17

What were the criticisms of Wegeners idea? Did he have a good answer to these criticisms? How does the Earths magnetic eld work? What causes it? Whats a magnetic dipole ? Whats the dierence between magnetic declination and magnetic inclination ? What is paleomagnetism ? How does paleomagnetism develop? How did apparent polar wander provide new evidence for continental drift? (Make sure you understand whats going on in Figures 2.5 and 2.6.) Seaoor Spreading : This is a big topic, and its covered over several pages, starting on p. 40. We probably spent a lot of time on it in class. Here are some of the sub-topics to make sure you understand: What is bathymetry ? How did information like bathymetric proles show the features of the sea oor? Whats the dierence between a mid-ocean ridge and a trench ? Where does high heat ow occur on the ocean oor? What are magnetic reversals ? How could the lava ows from an on-land volcano tell geologists about them? What is the magnetic-reversal chronology ? How are magnetic reversals recorded in the ocean crust as marine magnetic anomalies ? How does seaoor spreading lead to the pattern of marine magnetic anomalies? What does seaoor spreading imply about the age of the ocean crust at dierent places in the ocean basins? Is the oceanic lithosphere generally older or younger than the continents? How did deep-sea drilling help to test the hypothesis of seaoor spreading? What are the three major types of plate boundary? The mid-ocean ridges are examples of which type? Does open space develop between diverging plates? Why or why not? If you had a map of seaoor age (e.g. Figure 2.19), how could you use it to nd the mid-ocean ridges? How does the lithospheric mantle form at a mid-ocean ridge?

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What is subduction, and how does it relate to a convergent boundary? Whats an arc, and whats the dierence between a volcanic island arc and a continental volcanic arc ?

4.6
4.6.1

Material from Lab to Know for Test #3

Lab on Seismology (Seismology: The Instrumental Study of Earthquakes)

The lab on seismology gave you hands-on practice in several of the concepts that we discussed in lecture and which you read about in the textbook. Make sure that you noticed the places where I pointed this out in Section 4.2, above.

Material after Test 3 (but which shows up on the nal) starts here:

Which type of plate is always the downgoing plate in a subduction zone? Why is this? Can a continental plate ever get overridden? What do we mean by the polarity of a subduction zone? Where do the volcanoes occur in an arc? Whats a Wadati-Benio zone ? How can we use the patterns of earthquake depths to determine the polarity of a subduction zone? Transform plate boundaries whooee, this can be tricky. Make sure that you study Fig. 2.22 very carefully, as well as any similar concept sketches that you may have in your notes. Its easy to get confused by all the arrows! Make sure that you understand the following things about transform boundariesand can explain them: Compare Fig. 2.22a with Fig. 2.22b. Make sure you see how theyre basically showing the same thing. Where do the earthquakes occur along a boundary like the one shown in 2.22, and why they dont occur along the whole boundary. This is basically the same thing as asking whats the dierence between a transform fault and a fracture zone?

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 Make sure you understand why, in 2.22b, the plate at pt. 1 is younger than at pt. 2. (YOU MAY HAVE WORKED ON TRANSFORM FAULTS AND FRACTURE ZONES IN YOUR LAB. If so, your plate-tectonic lab would be a great thing to review here.) Mantle plumes and hot spots: What are they? How do they produce a hot-spot track ? Fig. 2.25 (on p. 58) gives a great overview of this stu. 5 What is the relationship between earthquakes and plate boundaries? Which kinds of boundaries have only shallow earthquakes? Why? Which kind of boundary has intermediate - (and sometimes deep) -focus earthquakes, and why? (Some of this gets back to the idea of the Wadati-Benio zone, which was rst described in Chapter 2.)

5.1

Chapter 14: Running Water: The Geology of Streams and Floods

In class we may have talked about the hydrologic cycle. How does this work? What are the major pathways that water from precipitation takes back towards the ocean? What are the conditions under which runo will occur? Its possible that we may have drawn a hydrograph, and talked about how the discharge of a stream changes thanks to a storm. Make sure you understand what discharge is, and how its specically measured at one particular point along a stream channel. What are the eects of urbanization on peak discharge? A lot of our discussion in class probably led up to a description of headward erosion. Make sure you understand how the stream valleys are lengthening themselves in the opposite direction from the way the waters owing. What are a drainage network, a drainage basin, and a drainage divide ? How does a stream erode the landscape over which it ows? What are the three kinds of load that a stream can carry? (We may have mentioned them back when we rst talked about sedimentary rocks.) What is a delta ?
Fig. 2.25d is a great example of a good, detailed concept sketch, such as you might draw on a test.
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Make sure you understand what a longitudinal prole (a.k.a. a long prole) is. (This can be a bit of a tricky concept. The textbooks story about Lewis and Clark is useful here.) What are the changes that occur in a longitudinal prole over time? (We may have introduced the idea of a longitudinal prole before talking about headward erosion.) What are the factors that would cause a stream to cut a valley rather than canyon, or vice-versa? What is the typical cross-prole shape of a stream valley? (Hint: Think of a letter of the alphabet.) Whats an alluvial fan ? What causes a braided stream to form? Why do streams commonly meander ? What are superposed and antecedent streams? What would cause a ood to happen? Whats the relationship between the annual probability and the recurrence interval of a particular ood scenario?

5.2

Chapter 16: A Hidden Reserve: Groundwater

What do we mean by groundwater ? What are pores, porosity, and permeability ? Whats the dierence between an aquifer and and aquitard ? What is the water table ? How would you know if you had reached it, if you were drilling down through an unconned aquifer? How does a conned aquifer dier from an unconned one? How does a well work? Whats the dierence between an ordinary and an artesian well? What causes an artesian well to occur? Whats the cone of depression, and how could one persons cone of depression cause their neighbors well to run dry? Whats the dierence between a well and a spring ? We probably discussed a typical story of groundwater contamination, using the example of a gas station with a leaking underground storage tank. Figure 16.12 in the textbook shows some aspects of groundwater contamination. Caves and Karst: Lots of cool stu here. What do we mean by a karst landscape? Whats special about the bedrock in such a landscape? How does a cave network form? 21

What is the relationship between the development of cave passages and the water table? How does the down-cutting of a river valley in a karst landscape lead to the presence of older, dry passages in a cave? (Figure 16.15 from the textbook will be useful here.) What are speleothems, such as stalactites and stalagmites, and how do they form?

5.3

Chapter 18: Amazing Ice: Glaciers and Ice Ages

How does glacier ice dier from ice like youd nd in the ice cube trays in your freezer, or on a frozen lake? What conditions are required for a glacier to form? Make sure you understand the concepts of the accumulation zone, the ablation zone, and the equilibrium line. What is the dierence between a mountain glacier (a.k.a. a valley or alpine glacier) and a continental glacier ? Between a temperate glacier and a polar glacier ? How does a glacier ow? Is there something present at the base of the ice (in the case of most temperate glaciers) that helps the basal sliding ? What other mechanism allows glaciers to ow? What are crevasses ? (Make sure you dont confuse this word with the word crevices.) How do they form? Why dont they usually extend below about 60 meters depth? How does this make a glacier into a kind of analogy for the Earths crust? How do glaciers erode bedrock? Why might we see glacial striations on bedrock in some areas? Make sure you know the various types of glacially-carved landforms, such as: U-shaped valley arete horn peak hanging valley cirque roche moutonee (how does this tell us about the direction of ice ow?) Glacial sediment deposits: What are outwash and till ? Whats a moraine ? 22

How could a set of nested moraines tell us about the retreat of a glacier? When were the major ice ages in Earth history? What are some of the factors that lead to ice ages? How does the Snowball Earth story work? How does the greenhouse eect work? How do ice ages aect sea level?

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