The dance of the continents has been reshaping Earth for billions of years, creating the landscapes we walk on today.

For decades, geologists labeled a billion-year stretch of Earth’s history—from 1.8 to 0.8 billion years ago—as the “Boring ...

The tiny Juan de Fuca plate is largely responsible for the volcanoes that dot the Pacific Northwest of the United States. The plates make up Earth's outer shell, called the lithosphere. (This includes ...

Computer simulations suggest that a collision with another planetary object early in Earth’s history may have provided the heat to set off plate tectonics. By Lucas Joel Some 4.5 billion years ago, ...

In the heart of Asia, deep underground, two huge tectonic plates are crashing into each other — a violent but slow-motion bout of geological bumper cars that over time has sculpted the soaring ...

Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. David Bressan is a geologist who covers curiosities about Earth. Video showing the movement of Earth’s tectonic plates over the ...

If plate tectonics, oceans and continents are rare on worlds throughout the universe, that is. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works.

Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. David Bressan is a geologist who covers curiosities about Earth. A handful of ancient zircon crystals found in South Africa hold ...

The closest technological species to us in the Milky Way galaxy could be 33,000 light years away and their civilization would have to be at least 280,000 years, and possibly millions of years, old if ...