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VIRTUALISATION Israeli desert is oldest known surface on Earth
VIRTUALISATION Israeli desert is oldest known surface on Earth | Israeli desert is oldest known surface on Earth |
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| by William Atkins | |
| Saturday, 09 May 2009 | |
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It is noted that there are individual rocks, which have previously been analyzed, that are much older than this large-surface area, but this area in Israel is considered to be the oldest substantial area on the surface of the Earth. Because of erosion and general weathering, tectonic plate activity, and other such factors, most surfaces on Earth are relatively new in age, at least when compared to this very old spot. In fact, this newly found spot is over four times older than the previously known oldest spot, which is in Death Valley in Nevada (in the United States). The article “Desert pavement-coated surfaces in extreme deserts present the longest-lived landforms on Earth” in the GeoScienceWorld Bulletin is authored by Ari Matmon, from The Institute of Earth Sciences, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel, and his colleagues: Ori Simhai, Rivka Amit, Itai Haviv, Naomi Porat, Eric McDonald, Lucilla Benedetti, and Robert Finkel. Desert pavements are surfaces found in deserts that are covered with dense, interlocking rock fragments. The researchers state in their GSW Bulletin article that, “All exposed rocks on Earth's surface experience erosion; the fastest rates are documented in rapidly uplifted monsoonal mountain ranges, and the slowest occur in extreme cold or warm deserts—millennial submeter-scale erosion may be approached only in the latter." And, "The oldest previously reported exposure ages are from boulders and clasts of resistant lithologies lying at the surface, and the slowest reported erosion rates are derived from bedrock outcrops or boulders that erode more slowly than their surroundings; thus, these oldest reported ages and slowest erosion rates relate to outstanding features in the landscape, while the surrounding landscape may erode faster and be younger.” Page two concludes. |
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