Technological changes assisting the understanding of the origin of life

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Technological changes assisting the understanding
of the origin of life

• Year 11 Biology

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• Plates tectonics and continental drift
• Radiometric dating
• Other methods

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Plate tectonics

• Geologists have developed our knowledge of the
  structure of the Earth using seismology, which is
  the study of the pressure or shock waves from
  earth quakes
• Towards the end of the 19th century they
  developed seismographs

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• Seismographs were used to measure and record the
  wave patterns from earthquakes

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• Geologists have also studied changes in the
  earths magnetic field and the composition of
  meteorites and volcanoes to learn more about the
  Earth.

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• Biologists are interested in the structure of the
  earth because the changing structure of the
  surface layers influenced the origin of the
  evolution of life

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Continental drift

• In the beginning of the 17th century, the English
  philosopher Francis Bacon noted that the east
  coast of America and the west coast of Africa
  looked as though they could fit together like a
  jigsaw puzzle.

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• The diagram above shows a map fit of the
  continental masses--this is a piece of data used
  to confirm that the continents drifted-- the
  concept of continental drift initiated the rock
  plate concept

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• This observation was supported by the remains of
  organisms embedded in rocks (fossils)

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• Remains of identical species of plants and
  animals were found on land masses that could fit
  together, but were separated by oceans

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• Scientists agreed that these land masses must
  have once been one
• German geologist Wegner in 1912 suggested that
  these land masses broke and drifted apart

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• Nobody could explain how this happened until 1965
  when a Canadian geologist J. Tuzo Wilson,
  supported the idea of continental drift and
  introduced the idea of sea floor spreading

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• Sea floor spreading- when ridges in the sea floor
  produced new material and spread apart.
• His ideas were based on the evidence from
  magnetic surveys of oceans ridges, which are
  large gashes in the ocean floor.