What geologic evidence would we use to track the northward drift of the Indian Plate?

Combined evidence from geomorphology, tomographic images, geochronology, paleontology and lithological indicators provide evidence for the palaeo-latitudinal position of the Indian plate as it was ripped from the Gondwana supercontinent and drifted northward1,2.

What was the geographical change in Tethys Ocean and what caused it?

The subduction of the Neotethys mid-ocean ridge was certainly responsible for a major change in the Jurassic plate tectonics. The Central Atlantic ocean opened in Early Jurassic time and extended eastwards into the Alpine Tethys in an attempt to link up with the Eurasian back- arc oceans.

What is happening between India and Asia what is it doing to the plate boundary?

The Indian Plate is currently moving north-east at five centimetres (2.0 in) per year, while the Eurasian Plate is moving north at only two centimetres (0.79 in) per year. This is causing the Eurasian Plate to deform, and the Indian Plate to compress at a rate of four millimetres (0.16 in) per year.

What is Tethys Sea Class 9?

The Tethys Ocean was the ocean which existed between the continents of Gondwana and Laurasia. These existed during much of the Mesozoic era, before the opening of the Indian and Atlantic oceans. It was during the Cretaceous period. These are also referred to as the Tethys Sea of Neotethys.

How was India moved from Africa?

The Gondwana was composed of modern South America, Africa, Antarctica, and Australia. When this supercontinent split up, a tectonic plate composed of India and modern Madagascar started to drift away. Then, India split from Madagascar and drifted north-eastward with a velocity of about 20 cm/year.

When did Antarctica drift over the South Pole?

Around 450 million years ago parts of Antarctica were actually north of the equator, and the continent only arrived at its present position at the South Pole within the last 70 million years or so.

What do scientists use as evidence to support the existence of the Tethys Sea?

Evidence of the Paleo-Tethys Sea is preserved in marine sediments now incorporated into mountain ranges that stretch from northern Turkey through Transcaucasia (the Caucasus and the Pamirs), northern Iran and Afghanistan, northern Tibet (the Kunlun Mountains), and China and Indochina.

How do we know the Tethys Ocean existed?

In 1885, the Austrian palaeontologist Melchior Neumayr deduced the existence of the Tethys Ocean from Mesozoic marine sediments and their distribution, calling his concept Zentrales Mittelmeer and described it as a Jurassic seaway, which extended from the Caribbean to the Himalayas.

What evidence suggests that the Australian and Indian plates are separating?

Recent studies, and evidence from seismic events such as the 2012 Indian Ocean earthquakes, suggest that the Indo-Australian Plate may have broken up into two or three separate plates due primarily to stresses induced by the collision of the Indo-Australian Plate with Eurasia along what later became the Himalayas, and …

Is India still moving into Asia?

We know that India is colliding with Asia, a process that began 50 million years ago and continues to this day. Nowadays, India is still moving in the same direction but with a lower velocity of about 4 cm/year, due to the resistance of the Eurasian plate.

When did the Tethys Ocean exist?

Tethys Sea, also called Tethys Ocean or Neo-Tethys Ocean, tropical body of salt water that existed from the end of the Paleozoic Era (541 million to about 252 million years ago) until the Cenozoic Era (66 million years ago to the present).

How did Tethys Sea evolve?

During the Jurassic period about 150 Mya, Cimmeria finally collided with Laurasia and stalled, so the ocean floor behind it buckled under, forming the Tethyan Trench. Water levels rose, and the western Tethys shallowly covered significant portions of Europe, forming the first Tethys Sea.

What is the origin of the Tethys Ocean?

The sea was named after Tethys, who, in ancient Greek mythology, was a sea goddess, a sister and consort of Oceanus, mother of the Oceanid sea nymphs and of the world’s great rivers, lakes and fountains. The eastern part of the Tethys Ocean is sometimes referred to as Eastern Tethys.

How were the Tethyan mountains created?

These mountains were created by continental collisions that eventually eliminated the sea. Tethys was named in 1893, by the Austrian geologist Eduard Suess, after the sister and consort of Oceanus, the ancient Greek god of the ocean. At least two Tethyan seas successively occupied the area between Laurasia and Gondwana during the Mesozoic Era.

How many Tethyan seas were there?

Tethys Sea. At least two Tethyan seas successively occupied the area between Laurasia and Gondwana during the Mesozoic Era. The first, called the Paleo (Old) Tethys Sea, was created when all landmasses converged to form the supercontinent of Pangea about 320 million years ago, late in the Paleozoic Era.

What are the crustal remains of the Tethys?

The Black, Caspian, and Aral seas are thought to be its crustal remains, though the Black Sea may, in fact, be a remnant of the older Paleo-Tethys Ocean. The Western Tethys was not simply a single open ocean.