In his free time last summer, Rice University geoscientist Ming Tang made a habit of comparing the niobium content in various rocks in a global minerals database. What he found was worth skipping a ...

The first half-billion years of Earth science were gnarly. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works. When Earth was just a wee young thing, ...

Geoscientists have solved an age-old mystery of oceanic volcanism and plate tectonics, explaining why some islands contain so much continental material despite their distance from continental plates.

Classical plate tectonic theory was developed in the 1960s. It proposed that the outer layer of our planet is made up of a small number of rigid plates separated by narrow boundaries. The surface of ...

A new study from researchers who have investigated rock sediments from east India believes they have found evidence that suggests Earth's first continents rose out of the ocean far earlier than ...

New research examining over 20 years of data captured by NASA’s twin climate satellites, GRACE and GRACE-FO, has revealed an “unprecedented” level of water loss among the planet’s continents, creating ...

The history of Earth's continents might be different from what we first thought. The most popular theory of how the continents formed billions of years ago may not be right, according to a paper in ...

Gear-obsessed editors choose every product we review. We may earn commission if you buy from a link. Why Trust Us? The impressive escarpments that line the coasts of continents speak to a geologic ...

Geologists have long debated when continents first formed. A new model suggests they took shape half a billion years earlier than thought, during our planet’s turbulent childhood — which could mean ...

A hypnotic new animation has revealed the journey of the continents over 540 million years, as huge landmasses drifted around the globe before settling into the positions we know today. The animation, ...

From December 3, 2025, the Gallery of the Five Continents will be open to visitors at the Louvre Museum, offering an ...