Mystery of the Earth

Author: Zhou Zhenling
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-05-01
Features: In the book "Mysteries of the Earth," you can learn about the following interesting facts about our planet: Our Earth, the age and layers of the Earth, the atmosphere, Earth? A Water Planet? Why isn't the sea salty, How much water is there on Earth, Will the oceans dry up? Tides, The Ocean Floor, Exploring the Depths of the Earth, The Asthenosphere and Lithosphere, Rocks on Earth, Earth's Crust Movements, Continents Drift, The Birth and Death of the Crust, The Six Great Plates, Mysterious Volcanoes, Earthquakes, Laughs and Tears of the Wind and Mountain Collapses, Climate Change, The Earth is Actually Very Hot, Is the Earth Getting Hotter? Geothermal Energy, Hot Springs and Geysers, Earth = Orange? The Earth is a Giant Magnet, Moving Poles, Animal Compass, Strata and Geological Ages.
About 4.6 billion years ago, the solar system originated from a cloud of interstellar gas and dust in the Milky Way—the solar nebula. The solar nebula, composed of gas and dust with a mass of about 100 to 1,000 times that of the Sun, rotated under its own gravity while rapidly contracting. It gradually shrank into a disk-shaped nebula with a thick center and thin edges. Later, the original Sun formed at the center of the nebula, while the material around it first formed into rings and then, through processes like collisions and accretion, gradually gave rise to the planets and moons of the solar system. And our Earth was born at that time too!