Marvelous Things About Planet Earth

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Marvelous Things About Planet Earth

By Trista - September 9, 2019

10. Plate tectonics keep the Earth comfortable.

Earth is the only planet in the solar system with plate tectonics. The outer crust of the Earth is broken up into regions known as tectonic plates. There are seven or eight major plates (depending on the criteria) and many minor plates. These are floating on top of the magma interior of the Earth and can move against one another. When two plates collide, one plate will go underneath the other, and where they pull apart, they will allow a fresh crust to form. This process is vital for a variety of reasons.

Not only does it lead to geological activity such as earthquakes, mountain-building, and oceanic trench formation, but it also is intrinsic to the carbon cycle. When microscopic plants in the ocean die, they fall to the bottom of the sea. Over long periods, the remnants of this life, rich in carbon, are carried back to the Earth’s interior and recycled. That pulls carbon out of the atmosphere, ensuring that we do not suffer a runaway greenhouse effect. Without the actions of plate tectonics, there would be no way to recycle this carbon, and the Earth would become an overheated place.

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9. Although many people believe Earth is round, it is almost a sphere, but not entirely!

Some people indeed think the Earth is flat. Although we really didn’t know at one point, it is easy to prove that the Earth isn’t flat. So, it is safe to say that many people tend to think that Earth is a sphere. However, thanks to modern astronomy and space travel, scientists have since understood that Earth is shaped like a flattened sphere or an oblate spheroid. This shape is similar to a sphere, but the poles are flattened, and the equator bulges. In the case of the Earth, this bulge is due to our planet’s rotation.

That means that the measurement from pole to pole is about 43 km less than Earth’s diameter across the equator. The feature that is the furthest from the center of the Earth is Mount Chimborazo in Ecuador. Keep reading to find out more amazing facts about the planet Earth. You can discover what the planet is made of, how much water it has, and more.

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8. Iron, oxygen, and silicon comprise the Earth — mostly.

To better understand the Earth’s components, you should also understand the basics of the Earth’s layers. The ocean basins and continents make up the ‘crust’ layer, which is the Earth’s outermost layer. It varies between three and 46 miles deep. If you could separate the Earth into piles of material, you would have four main components: iron, oxygen, silicon, and magnesium. The majority would be iron at 32.1%; the second would be oxygen at 30.1%. Silicon would come in third at 15.1%, and lastly, magnesium at 13.9%.

However, most of this iron is located at the ‘core’ of the Earth, which is the innermost layer. The core has two parts: a solid inner core and a liquid outer core. The inner core rotates at a different speed than the rest of the Earth. If you could get down and truly sample the Earth’s core, it would be 88% iron. On the other hand, if you tested the Earth’s crust, you would find that 47% of it is oxygen. The ‘mantle’ is between the crust and the core. It is about 1800 miles deep and is mostly composed of magnesium and iron. When this mantle layer is pushed through the crust, we experience volcanoes.

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7. Water covers 70 percent of the Earth’s surface.

When astronauts first went into space, they looked back at the Earth with human eyes for the first time. Based on their observations, the Earth acquired the nickname the “Blue Planet.” The nickname came as no surprise seeing how 70 percent of our planet is covered with oceans. In fact, our planet looks blue from outer space because of this vast amount of water. Ironically, our human bodies are also comprised of water. In fact, the body has about 50 to 70 percent of water — just like Earth!

The remaining 30 percent is the solid crust located above sea level. That is why scientists call it the continental crust. Underneath the water that fills the oceans and the dirt and plants covering the continents, the Earth’s surface is made of rock. The rocky layer under the Earth’s soil is called the crust which comprises the continents and ocean basins. Keep reading to discover how thick the Earth’s atmosphere really is. And what does that mean for us.

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6. Earth’s atmosphere is thickest within the first 30 miles from the surface.

Although the atmosphere is thickest within the first miles from the surface, it reaches over 6,000 miles into space. It comprises five main layers – the Troposphere, the Stratosphere, the Mesosphere, the Thermosphere, and the Exosphere. The Troposphere starts at the Earth’s surface and ends about 9 miles out. That is the densest part of the atmosphere, and this is where we experience all weather. The Stratosphere starts right after the Troposphere and extends to about 31 miles high. It is where you’ll find the ozone layer, which scatters UV radiation and protects us from the sun’s rays. The Mesosphere starts next and ends at about 53 miles away from the Earth’s surface. That is where meteors burn up.

The Thermosphere is the next layer and is a larger layer that extends out to 372 miles! It is where satellites orbit and where you’ll see auroras. The Ionosphere overlaps the Mesosphere and extends to the edge of space at about 600 miles. That is the layer that makes radio communication possible. As a rule, air pressure and density decrease the higher one goes into the atmosphere and the farther one is from the surface. The bulk of the Earth’s atmosphere is down near the Earth itself. The Exosphere merges with the emptiness of outer space, where there is no atmosphere and is composed of low densities of hydrogen, helium, nitrogen, oxygen, and carbon dioxide.

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5. The Earth’s molten iron core creates a magnetic field.

Have you ever thought about the Earth’s core? Or how magnetic fields work? You know all of these things exist, but do you understand them? After all, our planet is quite amazing! The Earth is like a giant magnet, with poles at the top and bottom near the actual geographic poles. The magnetic field it creates extends thousands of miles from the Earth’s surface and forms a region called the magnetosphere. Scientists think this magnetic field is generated by the molten outer core of the Earth, where heat creates convection methods of conducting materials to generate electric currents.

Without the magnetosphere, particles from the sun’s solar wind would hit Earth directly, exposing the planet’s surface to significant amounts of radiation. Instead, the magnetosphere channels the solar wind around the Earth, protecting us from harm. Thank goodness for those fields. Certain things happen to us every single day without us even realizing it. Keep reading to learn how long a day — and year — truly is on Earth!

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4. Earth does not take 24 hours to rotate on its axis.

Try to stay in your seat for this fantastic science fact about the Earth. You might not even believe it, but you should check the sources. It takes 23 hours, 56 minutes, and just over four seconds for the Earth to rotate once completely on its axis, referred to as a Sidereal Day. You might think that this makes a day four minutes shorter than we think it is. You may also question how day after day and within a few months, that day would be night, and night would be a day.

However, Earth orbits around the sun. Every day, the sun moves compared to the background stars by about one degree. Suppose you add up that little motion from the sun that we see because the Earth is orbiting around it and rotating on its axis. You get a total of 24 hours. People call this particular day Solar Day. Keep reading to learn how this affects the rest of the calendar. After all, if a day isn’t a full 24 hours then a month can’t be what it is, right? What about the entire year? Is it still 365 days? It’s time you learn the truth about our marvelous planet.

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3. The Earth completes one orbit every 365.242199 solar days.

There are 365 days in a year. This is common knowledge, right? You probably even learned that fact when you were a child in school. Ever since the 16th century, scientists have worked tirelessly to understand the relationship of how the Earth revolves around the sun. While most years are calculated for 365 days, the extra .242199 is a fact that goes a long way towards explaining why we need an extra calendar day every four years, aka during a leap year. The planet’s distance from the sun varies as it orbits.

The Earth is never the same distance from the sun from day today. If the year is divisible by 400, then it is a leap year. The exception to this rule is if the year in question is divisible by 100. Keep reading to learn more about the Earth’s moon. Do you know about the moon’s two co-orbital satellites? It’s time you learn more so you can share your knowledgeable information with your friends and family. You can impress them with your science smarts!

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2. Earth has one moon and two co-orbital satellites.

While many people know and understand that the Earth has one moon, did you know that two additional asteroids are locked into co-orbital orbits with Earth? People call them 3753 Cruithne and 2002 AA. They belong to a larger population of asteroids — Near-Earth Objects (NEOs). Scientists also refer to them as Earth Trojans. Experts sometimes call the asteroid 3753 Cruithne is as Earth’s second moon. But it doesn’t actually orbit the Earth but is even following its own distinct path around the sun. However, 2002 AA is making a horseshoe orbit around the Earth that brings it close to the planet every 95 years.

Other small, natural objects in orbit around the sun may enter orbit around Earth for a short period, making them temporary natural satellites until they exit our orbit. The only confirmed examples of this have been 2006 RH120 during 2006 and 2007 and 2020 CD3 between 2018 and 2020. There are also objects called “quasi-satellites.” The difference between them and standard satellites is that the orbit of a satellite of Earth depends on the Earth-Moon system’s gravity. In contrast, the quasi-satellite’s trajectory would not change if the Earth-Moon system were removed because it is orbiting the sun.

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1. The world boasts several million species of life, living in habitats from the bottom of the deepest ocean to a few miles from the atmosphere.

While there has been past discovered evidence of water and organic molecules on Mars and building blocks of life on Saturn’s moon, Titan, Earth is the only known planet to have life. Scientists have speculated about the possible existence of life beneath the icy crust of Jupiter’s moon Europa and Saturn’s moon Titan. As we’ve discussed, scientists have even looked for other planets that look like they could support similar life forms, perhaps in some search of connection. They also look for chemical combinations that could signal alien life: carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorous, sulfur, and hydrogen.

However, Earth remains the only confirmed place of life. Scientists are building experiments that will help find life on other planets if it exists. For instance, giant radio dishes currently scan distant stars, listening for intelligent life’s characteristic signals reaching out across interstellar space. NASA’s entire exoplanet program is to find life signs on a planet other than Earth, though this could take decades if not longer. One promising landmark in the search is the James Webb Space Telescope, launching this year! The Webb will be the largest, most powerful space telescope ever built and launched into space. Scientists hope that it could pick up signs of an atmosphere like ours, so keep your fingers crossed!

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