• Skip to main content
  • Skip to header right navigation
  • Skip to site footer
  • WordPress
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • YouTube
Science Update

Science Update

Sharing Science | Satisfying Curiosity | Debunking BS

  • Spotlights
  • Reality Check
  • Why Is It?
  • Radio Archives
  • Sciup @ School
Home » Radio Archive » Daily Show » Gondwana Breakup

Gondwana Breakup

June 5, 2008
https://podcast.scienceupdate.com/080605_sciup_gond.mp3

Podcast: Play in new window

BOB HIRSHON (host):
Breaking up a supercontinent…I’m Bob Hirshon and this is Science Update.

The continents of the southern hemisphere once formed a vast supercontinent called Gondwana. But about 183 million years ago, it began to split apart. Scientists once thought it broke into many small, independently moving pieces that migrated haphazardly across the southern oceans before reaching their current locations. But to structural geologists Matthias Konig and Graeme Eagles, these chaotic trajectories just didn’t make sense. Eagles explains.

GRAEME EAGLES (Univeristy of London):
This view of Gondwana was quite unusual in terms of the patterns of plate tectonics that we’ve observed from more recent times in the oceans.

HIRSHON:
So they created a new computer model of the ocean floor. It suggests that the supercontinent originally split into just two pieces. Millions of years later, smaller plates began to break off one-by-one, forming the landmasses of the southern hemisphere. I’m Bob Hirshon, for AAAS, the science society.

Category: Daily ShowTag: Environment & Conservation, Geology, Marine Science
Previous Post:Magnetic Stripe
Next Post:Fruit Fly Roundup

Sidebar

Radio Program Archives

Want to learn more about the brain? The environment? Here you can browse the topics that come up regularly on Science Update.

Search the Archives

Categories

  • Daily Show
  • Station Download
  • Weekly Show

Find By Tag

  • 2020
  • Acoustics & Sound
  • Aging
  • Animal Behavior
  • Anthropology
  • Archaeology
  • Astronomy & Space
  • Biology
  • Brain Science
  • Bugs
  • Chemistry
  • Children & Families
  • cicadas
  • Climate & Weather
  • Communications
  • Computer Science
  • Economics & Business
  • Education
  • Energy
  • Engineering & Technology
  • Environment & Conservation
  • Genetics & Evolution
  • Geology
  • Marine Science
  • Materials Science
  • Mathematics
  • Medicine & Health
  • Microbiology
  • Nanotechnology
  • Nutrition & Food Science
  • Paleontology & Dinosaurs
  • Physics
  • Plants & Agriculture
  • Political Science
  • Reality Check
  • Social & Behavioral Sciences
  • Sports & Fitness
  • spotlight
  • Spotlight Bugs
  • Terrorism & War
  • Why Is It? Questions
  • Wildlife
  • Year in Review

Find By Date

Science Update
  • About Science Update
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of Use

Follow Us

  • Facebook
  • YouTube

Recent Posts

Mayan Honeybee hives
House sparrow wearing top hat rides aboard a red fireworks rocket

Copyright © 2023 · Springtail Media LLC · All Rights Reserved · Powered by Pongos