Exam 20: Mountain Belts and the Continental Crust

The Andes Mountains, where the South America Plate overrides the Nazca Plate, are a consequence of ocean-continent convergence.

Frequent earthquakes, offshore trenches, and active volcanoes perched on top of older rock are all indications of ____.

_____ is the detachment of part of the mantle portion of the lithosphere beneath a mountain belt.

If the San Andreas Fault remains active, Los Angeles will continue northward and crash into ___.

On the North American continent, the Appalachian Mountains extend from western Canada through the western United States into New Mexico.

The sedimentary sequences that form on passive margins are predominantly ____.

Mountain belts are characterized by sedimentary sequences that show little or no deformation.

The _____ resulted from the collision of Asia and Europe.

The more open the folds, the less intense the deformation in a mountainous region.

A _____ is a group of closely spaced mountains or parallel ridges that may show a history of intrusive tectonic activity.

According to the concept of isostasy, lighter, less dense, continental crust "floats" higher on the mantle than denser oceanic crust.

Soapstone is a metamorphic rock composed of the mineral talc.

Seismic studies indicate that continental crust beneath mountains and cratons is essentially the same thickness.

Migmatites must have been transported much higher in the crust during and after ____.

Of the two major mountain belts in North America, the _______ are in the West.

Delamination is the detachment of the continental crust from the oceanic crust.

Major mountain belts with higher mountain ranges tend to be geologically ___________ relative to those where the mountains are lower.

_____ faults in the Tibetan plateau indicate that gravitational collapse is taking place.

Frequent earthquakes are characteristic of mountain belts that are young and active.

The system approach regards mountains as the products of three closely interdependent components. Which of the following is not one of those components?