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 process by which salts accumulate in soil.






2. The color of a mineral in its powdered form obtained from scraping a sample on a ceramic plate






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






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






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






6. The surface between the zone of saturation and the zone of aeration.






7. A large & basin-shaped volcanic depression & more or less circular in form. Typically steep-sided & found at the summit of a shield volcano.






8. Shapes & like mountains or hills that make up the Earth's surface.






9. 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






10. Any porous and permeable rock that yields oil or natural gas.






11. A steep or vertical cliff & either above or below sea level.






12. The principle that states the processes operating to change the Earth in the present also operated in the past.






13. A valley caused by extension of the Earth's crust. Its floor forms as a portion of the crust moves downward along normal faults.






14. The great circle on the Earth's surface passing through The North and South Poles & which is considered 0 degrees longitude. The prime meridian passes through Greenwich & England & and is used as a reference point for measuring longitude east and w






15. An instrument used to measure the speed of wind.






16. A region of high heat flow on the Earth's surface & thought to lie above a mantle plume .






17. The distance between two successive wave crests or troughs.






18. A disease-causing organism or entity & such as a bacterium or virus.






19. Any solid material that has settled out of a state of suspension in liquid.






20. A person who makes maps.






21. A sedimentary rock composed primarily of biogenic sediments.






22. A process of erosion in which wind carries off particles of dust and sand.






23. The generally dark & more or less stable part of the organic matter in a soil & so well decomposed that the original sources cannot be identified.






24. A building that contains one or more telescopes.






25. The closest galaxy to the Milky way. It is approximately 2 million light-years away.






26. The point on the Earth's surface directly above the focus of an earthquake.






27. A geometrical form taken by a mineral & giving external expression to orderly internal atomic arrangement.






28. A large amount of gas and dust in space & spread out in an immense volume.






29. A sedimentary rock made up of chemical sediments. Example: rock salt.






30. Uranus is named after the Roman god of the sky. It is the seventh planet from the Sun.






31. A steep-sided rounded extrusion of highly viscous lava squeezed out from a volcano and forming a dome-shaped or bulbous mass above and around the volcanic vent. The structure generally develops inside a volcanic crater.






32. A spring whose temperature is 6.5o C or more above mean annual air temperature.






33. An imaginary circle around the earth that represents the halfway mark between the North and South Poles and establishes the boundary between the Northern and Southern Hemispheres.






34. Pertaining to clastic material formed by volcanic explosion or aerial expulsion from a volcanic vent.






35. The portion of the continental margin that extends as a gently sloping surface from the shoreline seaward to a marked change in slope at the top of the continental slope . Seaward depth averages about 130 m.






36. A naturally occurring inorganic solid that has a well-defined chemical composition and in which atoms are arranged in an ordered fashion.






37. The layer of gases (air) & that surrounds a planet or moon.






38. A term applied to large areas of basaltic lava presumably extruded from fissures.






39. 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.






40. Large area of extremely flat ocean floor lying near a continent and generally over 4 km in depth.






41. Mountains & characterized by extensive folding and thrust faulting & that form at convergent plate boundaries on continents.






42. The outermost layer of the Earth & varying in thickness from about 10 kilometers (6 miles) below the oceans & to 65 kilometers (about 40 miles) below the continents; represents less than 1 percent of the Earth's volume.






43. Turbulent stream water flow down a steep gradient & but not as steep as in a waterfall.






44. Formed when an organism is flattened (compressed) and a thin film of organic material from its body is left in the rock.






45. The height of a place above sea level.






46. The perpendicular or very steep descent of a stream.






47. Synonym of intrusive. Antonym of volcanic. Applies to igneous rocks formed beneath the surface of the Earth; typically with large crystals due to the slowness of cooling.






48. A study designed to collect critical data to be used for comparison or as a control in a later study.






49. 1. A mass of sand & gravel & or alluvium deposited on the bed of a stream & sea & or lake & or at the mouth of a stream 2. A unit of pressure & approximately equal to atmospheric pressure at sea level.






50. The level of light that penetrates through water.