Picture the Earth’s crust and you most probably think of dense, dry rock. You don’t imagine a goey, honey-like substance trickling down into the planet’s deep underbelly. And yet, new research has ...

Researchers have made a new discovery that changes our understanding of Earth's early geological history, challenging beliefs about how our continents formed and when plate tectonics began. A study ...

It feels like there have been staggering science stories emerging every other day recently, all of which have blown our tiny little minds. First, there was the discovery of a terrifying black hole ...

New research reveals that Earth’s continents owe their stability to searing heat deep in the planet’s crust. At more than 900°C, radioactive elements shifted upward, cooling and strengthening the ...

In 1987, a worker lit a cigarette by a new water well near the village of Bourakebougou in Mali. But as he did, an explosion reverberated inside the well. We now know this was due to previously ...

Beneath California's Sierra Nevada mountains, the crust is peeling away. This process, called lithospheric foundering, is nothing to worry about. In fact, it may be how the continents first formed.

The Earth’s crust is constantly changing. It’s currently made of many huge rock slabs called tectonic plates—seven major ones along with many more smaller plates—that fit together like puzzle pieces ...

Stanford researchers have created the first-ever global map of a rare earthquake type that occurs not in Earth’s crust but in our planet’s mantle, the layer sandwiched between the thin crust and Earth ...

Billions of years ago, Earth was an uninhabitable rock covered in magma. Scientists are still working to decipher the tale of how it transformed into a blue and green orb teeming with life. However, ...

Modern continental rocks carry chemical signatures from the very start of our planet's history, challenging current theories about plate tectonics. Researchers have made a new discovery that changes ...