What fossils were found on different continents?
What fossils were found on different continents?
Fossils of similar types of plants and animals in rocks of a similar age have been found on the shores of different continents, suggesting that the continents were once joined. For example, fossils of Mesosaurus, a freshwater reptile, have been found both in Brazil and western Africa.
How can the same fossils be found on different continents?
They move at a very slow rate – usually measured in millions of years – and continents are either torn apart or collide together to form very large single continents. Fossils of the same genus/species suggest that contents that were once together, must have been together in the geological past.
How will you explain the discovery of very similar fossils in different continents in the existence of plate tectonics?
Finding identical or similar fossils in areas separated by vast distances were some of the first clues that scientists used to reconstruct past plate movement. This distribution of fossils led to theories that the southern continents were once joined in a supercontinent called Gondwana.
Do you think similar fossils can be found in two different continents on Earth?
Continental drift was a theory that explained how continents shift position on Earth’s surface. Set forth in 1912 by Alfred Wegener, a geophysicist and meteorologist, continental drift also explained why look-alike animal and plant fossils, and similar rock formations, are found on different continents.
Do you think similar fossils can be found on two different continents on Earth How can you prove this?
The only way these fossils can be found on continents that are separated by oceans is if the continents were once together (connected). These ancient animals and plants could not have swam across oceans! Fossil records are strong evidence that the continents do drift.
How does the presence of similar fossils of ancient plants and animals in different continents indicate?
Why do we see similar fossils across the world from each other?
When we find the same kinds of fossils in rocks from different places, we know that the rocks are the same age. Scientists look for ancestors and descendants through geologic time.
Why are similar fossils found on opposite sides of the planet?
The fossils of these organisms are found on lands that are now far apart. Wegener said the rocks had formed side by side and that the land had since moved apart. Mountain ranges with the same rock types, structures, and ages are now on opposite sides of the Atlantic Ocean.
Do we find the same fossils all over the world?
Different kinds of animals and plants live in different parts of the world. As a result, if you find fossils of the same animal or plant on different continents now, then that is evidence that those two continents may have been a single continent when those fossils were formed.
How the continents moved around the Earth?
Today, we know that the continents rest on massive slabs of rock called tectonic plates. The plates are always moving and interacting in a process called plate tectonics. The continents are still moving today. The two continents are moving away from each other at the rate of about 2.5 centimeters (1 inch) per year.
