Ancient plate tectonics in the Archean period differs from modern plate tectonics in the Phanerozoic period because of the higher mantle temperatures inside the early Earth, the thicker basaltic crust ...

Hell, or something like it, may be a little closer than we thought. As a new study published in Nature Geoscience reveals, geologists at Cornell and the University of Texas have discovered a “hidden” ...

Early in Earth’s history, the heat left over from the collision that formed the Moon left its surface an ocean of magma. As it cooled, its crust was frequently shattered by massive impacts that ...

Modern continental rocks carry chemical signatures from the very start of our planet's history, challenging current theories about plate tectonics. Researchers have made a new discovery that changes ...

Creative destruction: a thinner ocean plate sides under a continental plate, melting and recycling the ocean crust into the Earth’s interior and birthing volcanoes in this illustration of subduction, ...

In 2016, the geochemists Jonas Tusch and Carsten Münker hammered a thousand pounds of rock from the Australian Outback and airfreighted it home to Cologne, Germany. Five years of sawing, crushing, ...