NUME: TOMA CONSTANTIN CATALIN

CLASA: 13 FR2

OUR PLANET = EARTH

Earth is the only planet in the Solar System capable of supporting life. Located almost 150

million km (1 astronomical unit AU) from the Sun, it is located in the so-called habitable zone,

the area where temperatures are maintained within limits that allow the existence of liquid water.

THE EVOLUTION OF THE EARTH The Earth formed 4.57 billion years ago in the solar
nebula, along with the Sun and other planets. At first the rock was melted, and then the planet
began to cool and solidify on the surface. The primordial atmosphere was produced by volcanic
activity. The ice, probably delivered by comets that came in contact with the ground, cooled the
atmosphere and later produced the oceans. The moon also soon formed in the beginning, most
likely by the collision of the Earth with another body, the size of the planet Mars, generically
called Theia.

Life appeared about 4 billion years ago. The discovery, by bacteria, of photosynthesis, led to the

massive appearance of oxygen, necessary for the development of complex life and also for the

appearance of the ozone layer, protection against ultraviolet radiation, allowing life to go ashore.

The future of our planet is closely linked to the Sun. Its brightness will continue to increase over

time, being 10% stronger in 1.1 billion years and 40% over 3.5 billion years. Increasing the

temperature and radiation level will probably lead to the loss of the oceans by evaporation. In 5

billion years, the Sun will turn into a red giant, extending to the current orbit of the Earth. Until

then, however, the real orbit of the planet will migrate to 1.7 AU, and even if it is not directly
swallowed by the star, the dramatic temperature will melt the rock, and the atmosphere will have

evaporated and been lost in space long ago.

The earth will gradually cool, which will lead to the loss of oceans and atmosphere, due to the

lack of volcanism.

THE ORBIT OF THE EARTH

The earth has an axis inclined at 23.5 degrees, which causes the seasons. When one of the

hemispheres is directed towards the Sun, at a certain moment in its orbit, it is summer here, and

if it is far away and not sufficiently illuminated, it experiences winter.

The interaction between the Earth and the Moon slows the rotation of the Earth by 2 milliseconds

per century. Current research indicates that 900 million years ago a year had 481 days, each of

18 hours. Today, the day lasts 23 hours, 56 minutes and 4,091 seconds.

The speed with which the planet moves in orbit is about 30 km / s, which means that it travels

the distance that represents its diameter in 7 minutes, and the Earth-Moon distance in 4 hours.

The earth undergoes a precession movement with a period of 25,800 years and a notation

movement with a period of 18.6 years. These are caused by the different attraction of the Sun

and the Moon, and the Earth does not have a perfectly spherical shape, but is bulging at the

equator.

EARTH CLIMATE Earth is the only planet that has a temperature that can support
liquid water at the surface. The average temperature is +15 oC. The limits are -100 oC
to +60 oC. The major regions that differ depending on the climate are the two polar
regions, two temperate regions and the equatorial-tropical zone. Ocean currents are an
important factor that determines the climate, distributing energy from the equator to the
poles. WATER The abundance of water on Earth makes it called the blue planet. Water
from oceans, seas, rivers and lakes, along with groundwater, forms the hydrosphere. Its
average depth (formed mainly by oceans) is 3,794 m, more than 5 times the average
height of the continents. The total mass of water is 1.35 × 1018 t, or 4,400 parts of the
Earth's mass. The Earth's surface is 70% covered by oceans. This is vital to life as we
know it. It is the only planet on the surface of which water can exist in liquid form. There
are other liquids trapped in circuits on other celestial bodies (such as methane and
liquid ethane on Titan) or water under huge layers of ice (Europe) or under the ground
(Enceladus).

TERRESTRIAL ATMOSPHERE The Earth has an atmosphere almost 100 times less
dense than the planet Venus, but 100 times denser than the Martian atmosphere. It
does not have a proper border, gradually becoming thinner. 3/4 of its total mass is
contained in the first 11 km altitude (troposphere). The Earth's atmosphere is composed
mostly of nitrogen (78.8%) and oxygen (20.94%), as well as other elements (argon -
0.93%, carbon dioxide - 0.038%, water - traces, varies with climate). Carbon dioxide
was probably much more abundant a few billion years ago, but it was dissolved in the
oceans or trapped in rocks (carbonates). This low amount of carbon dioxide in the
atmosphere is very important for maintaining the heat received from the Sun, because it
produces a greenhouse effect, heating the soil by 35 degrees (from -21 C to a
comfortable +14 C). This greenhouse effect is beneficial to us to a certain extent;
human activities in the past and present, however, increase this amount worryingly, the
greenhouse effect becoming too strong, and especially risking to break the fragile
balance and become galloping and unstoppable. Note that higher heat leads to the
release of more carbon dioxide stored in water and soil as Venus shows… The oxygen
in the atmosphere is very reactive, combining quickly. That is why it must be
regenerated continuously. This is especially done by plants and ocean plankton.
Without it, life, for the most part, would die out. Terrestrial clouds are made up of water
vapor, spread throughout the atmosphere and covering, at any time, half of the Earth's
surface.
Atmospheric layers: Troposphere (contains most of the mass of the atmosphere, water
vapor and aerosols); :: stratosphere (between 10 and 50 km, increases in temperature
with altitude, which makes it dynamically stable, without convection and turbulence; at
its base travel planes to avoid too much turbulence in the troposphere; ozone in the
ozone layer in the stratosphere prevents ultraviolet radiation, for the most part, from
reaching the ground); Mesosphere (between 50 and 80 km, the temperature decreases
with altitude); Thermosphere (ultraviolet radiation causes gas ionization; temperature is
directly dependent on solar activity; from 80 to 500 km); :: exosphere (from 500 to 1,000
km, gas molecules have very high temperatures, over 2,500 C, but the rarefaction leads
to an extremely low average temperature). the whole atmosphere rises to over 250 km.
Seen from space, the layers as thick as the troposphere and stratosphere are seen as a
bright blue arc surrounding the horizon, while the other layers are not visible.

LAND SURFACE The earth is shaped like a geoid, a slightly flattened sphere at the

poles. The rotation causes a rise of the equator, so that the equatorial diameter is 43 km larger

than the polar diameter. The largest local deviations are Mount Everest (8,850 m high) and the
Marianas Pit (10,924 m deep). If we compare it with a perfect ellipsoid, the Earth has a tolerance

of 1/584 (0.17%), about as much as required for a quality billiard ball.

The earth's surface is very young. Every 500 million years, erosion and tectonic movement of the

plates destroy and restore the soil almost completely. The age of the planet is 4.57 billion years,

but the oldest rocks are 4 billion years old, and rocks older than 3 billion years are extremely

rare. The oldest fossils, evidence of life, are 3.9 billion years old, but we have no material

evidence of the beginnings of terrestrial life.

The Earth's crust is divided into several solid plates that float independently on the liquid mantle.

These are the well-known tectonic plates. They interact through two processes: expansion (when

one plate moves away from another and a new crust forms between them) and subduction (when

one of the plates enters under the other and is destroyed in the mantle).

There are currently 8 large tectonic plates:

North American plate - North America, Northwest Atlantic and Greenland

South American plate - South America and the Southwest Atlantic

Antarctic plate - Antarctica and the southern ocean

Eurasian plate - Northeast Atlantic, Europe and Asia except India

African plate - Africa, the Southeast Atlantic and the western Indian Ocean

Indian-Australian plate - India, Australia, New Zealand and most of the Indian Ocean

Nazca Plate - East Pacific

Pacific plate - most of the Pacific OceanThere are also many other small boards. Earthquakes

generally occur at their borders. There are also traces of ancient craters on the earth's surface,

although erosion is strong.

INTERNAL STRUCTURE OF THE EARTH

The structure of the Earth is probably similar, in general, to other bodies in the region. There are

also differences: The moon has at best a small nucleus. Mercury has a very large nucleus relative

to its size. The mantle of Mars and the Moon is much thicker. Moon and Mercury may not have

a chemically differentiated crust at all. Earth could be the only one with a distinct upper and

lower core. However, all these are theories, it should be noted that it is not known exactly and is

not fully experimentally proven any internal structure, not even that of the Earth.

he division into the lithosphere and asthenosphere was made in the 1940s, the lithosphere being a

solid layer, floating on a liquid or semi-liquid layer, the asthenosphere. The lithosphere includes

the crust, but also a portion of the mantle. The asthenosphere is the top of the mantle. This

classification should not be confused with the one based on the chemical composition, which

separates the crust from the mantle.

The crust varies considerably in thickness. It is very thin under the ocean floor and very thick

under the continents. The composition of the crust is mostly reduced to oxides, the only

important exceptions being chlorides, sulfides and fluorides (less than 1%). Thus almost half of

the crust can be said to be oxygen. It mainly contains silicates.

The mantle is divided into two layers, separated by a transition region. The distinction between

mantle and crust is based on the chemical composition, types of rocks and seismic

characteristics. Here, the temperatures are between 500 and 900 degrees Celsius in the upper

region, reaching up to 4,000 degrees Celsius in the part adjacent to the core. Due to these

differences, there are convection movements in the jacket, where the hot material rises more

easily to the surface, and the cooled one descends towards the center. The convection mechanism

is chaotic and is related to the movement of tectonic plates. The pressure in the mantle reaches

1.4 million atmospheres.

The core is the densest part of the globe. It consists mainly of iron, then nickel and other lighter

elements. The core is divided into the inner, solid, with a radius of ~ 1,220 km and an outer core,

liquid, with a radius of 3,400 km. There is a theory that the solid core would form a single iron

crystal. The outer core has convection currents, which produce the Earth's magnetic field,

following the dynamo effect.

The inner core and crust are solid; the outer core and mantle are semifluid.

Most of the Earth's mass is in the mantle, almost the rest being in the outer core. Here is a

representation of the masses of the different layers (values that multiply by 10 ^ 24 kg):

atmosphere = 0.0000051

oceans = 0.0014

crust = 0.026

mantle = 4,043

outer core = 1,835

inner core = 0.09675

The chemical composition of the whole Earth would be (depending on the mass): 34.60% iron,

29.50% oxygen, 15.20% silicon, 12.70% magnesium, 2.40% nickel, 1.90% sulfur, 0.05%

titanium.

The Earth is the densest object of appreciable size in the Solar System.

MAGNETIC FIELD

The earth has a modest magnetic field, produced by electric currents that arise in the nucleus

through the effect of dynamo. The interaction between the high-energy particles of the solar

wind and the Earth's magnetic field produces the aurora. This interaction also produces the Van

Allen belts, a pair of ionized gas (plasma) rings orbiting the Earth, between 7,600 and 13,000

km, and the second between 19,000 and 41,000 km altitude.

The axis of the magnetic poles is inclined by 11.5 degrees to the axis of the geographic poles.

The magnetic poles change over time, migrate and can be reversed. Evidence of reversals in the

history of the planet lies in the rocks, and they occur in about 10,000 years. The interval between

these changes is 0.7-1.7 million years.