Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. An award-winning reporter writing about stargazing and the night sky. Are we alone, and if so, why? So far, the search for ...

The plate tectonics theory established in the 20th century has been successful in interpreting many geological phenomena, processes, and events that have occurred in the Phanerozoic. However, the ...

Fifty years ago, there was a seismic shift away from the longstanding belief that Earth's continents were permanently stationary. At 50 years old, with a surge of interest in where the surface of our ...

For decades, scientists have accepted a particular theory regarding the evolution Earth’s plate tectonics, but a recent study published in Nature Geoscience could defy this as a team of researchers ...

From continental drift to plate tectonics / Naomi Oreskes -- Stripes on the sea floor / Ron Mason -- Reversals of fortune / Frederick J. Vine -- The zebra pattern / Lawrence W. Morley -- On board the ...

In the Nature PastCast series, we delve into the archives to tell the stories behind some of Nature’s biggest papers. This year, Nature celebrates its 150th birthday. To mark this anniversary we’re ...

It’s right there in the name: “plate tectonics.” Geology’s organizing theory hinges on plates—thin, interlocking pieces of Earth’s rocky skin. Plates’ movements explain earthquakes, volcanoes, ...

Readers who went to school before the late 1960s will probably remember that their science teachers couldn't explain why South America and Africa seemed to fit together like pieces in a jigsaw puzzle.

Plate tectonics may be unique to Earth and may be an essential characteristic of habitable planets. Estimates for its onset range from over 4 billion years ago to just 800 million years ago. A new ...

But the theory of plate tectonics has rocked this picture of the planet to its core. Plate tectonics reveals how Earth’s surface is constantly in motion, and how its features — volcanoes, earthquakes, ...

W. Jason Morgan, who in 1967 developed the theory of plate tectonics -- a framework that revolutionized the study of earthquakes, volcanoes and the slow, steady shift of the continents across the ...