energies
1 - The Sun provides most of the ENERGY that the Earth uses....
2 - Plants capture solar ENERGY and use it in their growth...
3 - Herbivores use the plants they eat to gain ENERGY...
4 - Man uses the food he eats to acquire ENERGY: some of this ENERGY is stored in the muscles as POTENTIAL ENERGY
5 - The ENERGY from the muscles is used to oppose gravity, making the hammer go up, which gains POTENTIAL ENERGY...
6 - When going down, due to the action of gravity and the muscles, the POTENTIAL ENERGY of the hammer is transformed, essentially, into KINETIC ENERGY.
7- When the hammer hits the plate and stops a new logo of Energies begins... the hammer stays static... the weight goes up, the weight remains static...
8 - When the hammer hits the plate, most of that ENERGY is transmitted to the weight in the form of KINETIC ENERGY. This ENERGY will essentially be used to overcome the gravitational force and in this way the weight will gain POTENTIAL ENERGY
9 - If the initial KINETIC ENERGY of the weight is enough, it will be able to reach the bell; part of the ENERGY will then be used to ring the bell and make the air vibrate in order to propagate sound. If there is no energy source that makes the weight stand still near the bell, the gravitational force will make it fall....
Solid, liquid or gaseous? a question
All the objects we deal with are made of atoms. The way they interact determines the physical state of matter.
In solids the particles are packed rigidly and regularly. In liquids they are close together but not regularly arranged. In gases they are separated and also have no regular arrangement.
When energy is supplied to a system, the interaction between the particles decreases, solids become liquids (fusion) and liquids become phases (evaporation). These three states of matter differ in the ease with which their shapes and volumes can change.
The Earth has a unique situation in the Solar System. The pressure and temperature conditions at the surface of our planet permits the existence of water in a solid (ice), liquid (water) and gaseous (water vapour) state.
The diagram of water phases shows us the combinations of pressure and temperature of each of the physical states in which we can find this substance.
Gravity is the same, but...
The transport of rock particles by water is only possible as long as the water is in motion. In fact, only the kinetic energy of moving water allows the movement of materials that are denser than the liquid that transports them. As soon as the water starts to lose speed, which happens for example when the rivers reach the oceans, it can no longer displace the rock fragments. With nothing to transport them, the action of gravity leads to the vertical fall of these fragments; this is called sedimentation.
The rock particles carried by water are not all the same size, nor do they all have the same density. Different materials are usually mixed together. The resistance of that the fluid offers to the falling particles will therefore be different from particle to particle. This causes differential sedimentation, in which the largest andheaviest particles will fall first.This process is at the origin of the dimensional gradation of the particles that is often found in some layers of sedimentary rocks. In these you can see that the coarser particles are at the bottom while the finer ones are closer to the surface (top).
EARTH
Ever since Man began to be able to obtain images of the Earth from Space that a huge surprise was in store for him... a magnificent blue sphere stood out clearly, not only from the darkness of interplanetary space, but also from the other bodies of the Solar System...
Blue Planet he called it then. And this color was not due to a simple whim of Nature... It resulted from the fact that about 3/4 of the Earth's surface was covered with water.
If all this water were evenly distributed on the Earth's surface, it would form an ocean about 2750 meters deep.
However, this water is distributed very heterogeneously over several subsystems, although two of them (oceans and ice) contain almost all of the existing water (about 99.5%).
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Oceans - is by far the most important reservoir containing about 97.5% of the hydrosphere's water.
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Ice - contains about 80% of the water that is not in the oceans, or about 2% of the total water in the hydrosphere. Most of the ice is located in the glaciers of Antarctica and Greenland.
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Groundwater - This is the water stored in the pores of rocks and soils. It contains about 20% of the water not contained in the oceans, ie about 0.5% of the total water in the hydrosphere.
The three previous reservoirs contain almost all the water in the hydrosphere. What may be surprising is that all the other water in the hydrosphere (including rivers and lakes) represents less than 0.02% of the total:
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Lakes - 0.017%
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Atmosphere - 0.0001%
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Rivers - 0.0001%
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Living beings - negligible..
HYDROLOGICAL CYCLE... The perpetual motion!
Ever since Man began to be able to obtain images of the Earth from Space that a huge surprise was in store for him... a magnificent blue sphere stood out clearly, not only from the darkness of interplanetary space, but also from the other bodies of the Solar System...
Blue Planet he called it then. And this color was not due to a simple whim of Nature... It resulted from the fact that about 3/4 of the Earth's surface was covered with water.
If all this water were evenly distributed on the Earth's surface, it would form an ocean about 2750 meters deep.
However, this water is distributed very heterogeneously over several subsystems, although two of them (oceans and ice) contain almost all of the existing water (about 99.5%).
-
Oceans - is by far the most important reservoir containing about 97.5% of the hydrosphere's water.
-
Ice - contains about 80% of the water that is not in the oceans, or about 2% of the total water in the hydrosphere. Most of the ice is located in the glaciers of Antarctica and Greenland.
-
Groundwater - This is the water stored in the pores of rocks and soils. It contains about 20% of the water not contained in the oceans, ie about 0.5% of the total water in the hydrosphere.
The three previous reservoirs contain almost all the water in the hydrosphere. What may be surprising is that all the other water in the hydrosphere (including rivers and lakes) represents less than 0.02% of the total:
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Lakes - 0.017%
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Atmosphere - 0.0001%
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Rivers - 0.0001%
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Living beings - negligible..
erosion the continual destruction of the continents
By acquiring movement, water becomes capable of transporting objects...leaves...trunks, but also stones...
Over millions of years, colossal quantities of rocky materials are transported from the continents to the oceans.
The surface of the continents thus becomes the target of radical changes in which all landscapes always appear to us as temporary situations.
Erosion is the process that destroys the existing landforms of continents.
Material derived from the Earth's crust (soil and rock fragments or in solution) generally moves from higher to lower altitude regions. This movement is made along paths (rivers, glaciers, wind, etc...) which are often long and complex but which end up carrying materials to the oceans that constitute the great basins where they end up being deposited. Often there are breaks in these paths, forming sediment accumulations on the continents (eg alluvial, lacustrine, wind and glacial deposits), which are always transient situations, because they are continuously subject to the action of erosive processes that are predominant on the continents.
from water to rock
A large part of the Earth's surface is covered by sedimentary material that resulted mainly from the chemical weathering and mechanical fragmentation of the rocks that make up the continents. This process of destruction of the surface rocks gives rise to both solid fragments and dissolved material. It is the accumulation of this material that eventually gives rise to sedimentary rocks.
As one would expect, the classification of these types of rocks reflects the very distinct genesis of the sediments that constitute them into two main groups:
classic rocks -formed by rock fragments produced mainly by physical weathering and by clay minerals produced by chemical weathering. The classification of this type of rock is made according to the size of the particles that constitute them, which reflects the intensity of the agent that transports the particles:
particle diameter _cc781905-5cde -3194-bb3b-136bad5cf58d_ _cc781905-5cde-3194-bb3b- 136bad5cf58d_ rock type
greater than 2 mm _cc781905 -5cde-3194-bb3b-136bad5cf58d_ _cc781905-5cde-3194- bb3b-136bad5cf58d_ conglomerate
between 2 and 0.062 mm _cc781905 -5cde-3194-bb3b-136bad5cf58d_ sandstone
between 0.062 and 0.0039mm siltstone
less than 0.0039 mm _cc781905 -5cde-3194-bb3b-136bad5cf58d_ _cc781905-5cde-3194-bb3b- 136bad5cf58d_ argillite
Chemical rocks and biochemical- are formed by the precipitation of ions dissolved in water during chemical weathering. These ions are essentially transported in solution to the oceans where they are mixed with seawater. Through chemical and biochemical reactions, the ions are precipitated from solution and the particles thus formed settle to the ocean floors. These rocks are mainly classified according to their chemical composition: limestones (calcium carbonate) are the most abundant chemical/biochemical sedimentary rocks.
from water to rock
Unequally heated by solar radiation, the thin layer of gas that covers the whole of our planet (the atmosphere), is in continuous movement.
The movement of the atmosphere parallel to the topographic surface is called wind.
The capacity of wind to erode, transport and deposit sediments is very similar to that of water. However as air has only 1/1000th the density of water and 1/50th the viscosity, winds are much less powerful than water currents.
Therefore, despite being an efficient transport agent, wind is usually unable to transport particles larger than 2mm. Particles with the dimensions of sand (between 2mm and 0.062mm) are transported close to the ground and only dust (detrital materials formed by particles generally smaller than 0.01mm in diameter) can reach a few kilometers in height and then easily cross oceans.
Why not a huge swamp?
Under the constant attack of atmospheric agents, colossal amounts of sediment are dragged every year from the continents to the oceans. In a few tens of millions of years this process is capable of transforming any mountain range into an extensive plain.
And yet the Earth is 4 550 million years old...
And despite everything, there are still Mountain Ranges...
What process will be able to oppose the flattening of the continents?
water on hard rock...
When we see the water from the sea, from a river, or from the rain passing over a rock, we get a notion of its powerlessness in the face of the apparent resistance of the rock. Steady as a rock, says popular tradition, and yet millions of drops of water over millions of years.
No rock can resist. Transformed into another material - chemical weathering - or just broken into smaller and smaller fragments - chemical weathering - this is inevitably the fate of a rock on the surface of our planet.
Weathering is the general process by which rocks on the Earth's surface are destroyed.
Chemical weathering, as the name implies, corresponds to the destruction of rocks induced by chemical reactions. The resulting products of this type of weathering may include dissolved solids and new minerals (usually clays).
Physical weathering corresponds to the fracturing of unaltered or very slightly altered rocks.
During erosion the two types of weathering usually act together: chemical weathering weakens the rock, while physical weathering eventually destroys it, making it available for the transport process.
