Test your basic knowledge |

Earth Science

Subject : science
Instructions:
  • Answer 50 questions in 15 minutes.
  • If you are not ready to take this test, you can study here.
  • Match each statement with the correct term.
  • Don't refresh. All questions and answers are randomly picked and ordered every time you load a test.

This is a study tool. The 3 wrong answers for each question are randomly chosen from answers to other questions. So, you might find at times the answers obvious, but you will see it re-enforces your understanding as you take the test each time.
1. A small & dust-bearing whirlwind.






2. A commonly used scale of earthquake intensity.






3. A glaciated valley now flooded by the sea.






4. A soft compact calcite & CaCO3 & with varying amounts of silica & quartz & feldspar & or other mineral impurities & generally gray-white or yellow-white and derived chiefly from fossil seashells.






5. The process of mountain building.






6. The internal resistance to flow in a liquid.






7. 1. A steep-walled & usually conical depression at the summit or on the flanks of a volcano & resulting from the explosive ejection of material from a vent. 2. A bowl-shaped depression with a raised & overturned rim produced by the impact of a meteori






8. The area immediately below the ground surface within which pore spaces are partially filled with water and partially filled with air.






9. Pluto is named after the Roman god of the Underworld. No longer considered a planet.






10. The areas of & in & or constituting a city.






11. That portion of the Earth below the crust and reaching to about 2 &780 km & where a transition zone of about 100 km thickness separates it from the core.






12. Sediments produced directly by the life processes of plants or animals.






13. A cyclical pattern of movement in a fluid body such as the ocean & the atmosphere & or the Earth's mantle & driven by density variations which in turn are the result of differences in temperature from one part of the fluid to another.






14. Forms along a coast as wave erosion cuts through a headland.






15. Any accumulation of material & by settling from water or air & chemical precipitation & evaporation from solution & etc.






16. An eruption of lava that takes place from a fracture & usually without producing a cone.






17. The theory that states that the present-day continents are the fragmented pieces of preexisting larger landmasses called supercontinents.






18. Highly mafic igneous volcanic rock & typically fine-grained and dark in color; rough volcanic equivalent of gabbro. Basalt is the most abundant volcanic rock in the Earth's crust.






19. A depression in the ground formed by the melting of a block of glacier ice buried or partially buried by drift.






20. The environment where a particular plant or animal is normally found.






21. The process by which building stone & usually in blocks or sheets & is extracted from the Earth. radiation -- (Electromagnetic radiation) -- energy that travels through space in the form of waves without the intervention of matter & as in the transp






22. Heat transport by direct transfer of energy from one particle to another & without moving the particle to a new location.






23. A guide to reading a map that typically contains distance scales & arrows indicating direction & and/or explanations of symbols used.






24. The rise and fall of sea level caused by the gravitational pull of the Sun and Moon on the Earth.






25. A unit of length used in sea navigation based on the length of 1 minute of arc on a great circle. On Earth & 1 minute of latitude.






26. A time of unusual winds and currents in the Pacific Ocean . El Nino generally causes warmer-than-normal sea surface temperatures and increased rainfall and storm activity.






27. A ball of ice and dust & whose orbit is a long & narrow ellipse.






28. Where one plate slides beneath another plate as the two are pushed together & a subduction zone.






29. The chronological sequence of units of Earth time.






30. Destruction of the ozone layer caused by the release of CFC's (chlorofluorocarbons) into the atmosphere which react chemically with ozone and break it down into different gases.






31. The two days of the year on which neither hemisphere is tilted toward or away from the sun.






32. Elongated rises on the ocean floor where basalt periodically erupts & forming new oceanic crust.






33. A mound or ridge of sediment deposited by a glacier.






34. A famous scientist who proposed that the Sun was the center of the solar system not the Earth. (Heliocentrism)






35. A large area of flat or nearly flat land.






36. The tendency of a moving object to continue in a straight line or a stationary object to remain in place.






37. Flat land covered with tall grass and wildflowers.






38. A system that uses a constellation of 24 satellites & their ground stations & and individual GPS receivers to accurately locate points on Earth.






39. Temporary accumulations of sediments that collect between low and high water marks.






40. The transformation of a soil from a solid to a liquid state as the result of increased pore pressure.






41. A curved belt of volcanic islands lying above a subduction zone.






42. He area from which a stream and its tributaries receives its water.






43. Swamp that forms in the low lying flood plain behind a levee.






44. An accumulation of wind driven sand into a distinctive shape.






45. The line formed by the intersection of the axial plane of a fold with a bedding plane & marking where the bed shows its maximum curvature.






46. A waterway from open ocean into a lagoon.






47. A broad & deep & generally straight furrow carved in bed rock by the abrasive action of debris embedded in a moving glacier. Larger and deeper than a glacial striation.






48. A natural open space underground & large enough for a person to enter. Most commonly occur by the dissolution of soluble rocks & generally limestone.






49. Igneous. Antonym of intrusive. Synonym of volcanic. Pertaining to igneous rocks or features formed from lava released on the Earth's surface.






50. The point on the Earth's surface where a magnetic needle points vertically downward (north magnetic pole) or vertically upward (south magnetic pole).