What is diagenesis?
A) The change from a sedimentary rock to a metamorphic rock
B) The weathering of carbonate rock due to dissolution
C) The textural, compositional, and other changes that occur to sediments after
deposition
D) The two-stage cooling process that creates porphyritic rocks
Put the steps of formation of the early solar system in order from oldest to youngest.
(Note: “First” refers to the oldest event and “Fifth” refers to the youngest.)
A) Rapid expansion of compact, dense mass to create matter and space.
B) Accretion of bodies to create protoplanets.
C) Formation and rotation of solar nebula.
D) Contraction of gases and start of nuclear fusion in the first stars.
E) Accretion of rocky debris creates planetesimals.
1. First
2. Second
3. Third
4. Fourth
5. Fifth
What is a pluvial lake?
A) A lake that forms on the margins of glaciers from glacial meltwater
B) A lake that fills in an arid/semiarid region due to increased precipitation in a cooler,
wetter climate
C) A lake forming from a stagnant piece of melting glacial ice caught between two
recessional moraines
D) A subterranean lake forming in a sinkhole
What are two examples of inorganic limestone?
A) Oolitic limestone and coquina
B) Chalk and calcite
C) Travertine and oolitic limestone
D) Chalk and coquina
________ occurs when weathering concentrates minor amounts of metals scattered
through unweathered rock into economically valuable concentrations.
A) Passive collection
B) Secondary enrichment
C) Concentration
D) Hydraulic fracturing
What is an index fossil?
A) An organism that existed for a vast period of time and is representative of an era
B) An organisms that is restricted to one small, geographic setting
C) A trace fossil that defines a colony of organisms
D) An organism that was geographically widespread but limited to a short span of
geologic time
What feature is visible in this image?
A) Blowout
B) Bajada
C) Desert pavement
D) Ventifact
What tool is often used to measure the topography of the seafloor today?
A) High-resolution multibeam instruments
B) Sonar
C) Echo sounders
D) Radar altimeters
Which tectonic boundary would have many normal faults associated with it?
A) Convergent
B) Divergent
C) Transform
Match the type of fossilization with the correct definition.
A) Indirect evidence of fossil life (i.e. tracks, burrows)
B) Hollows left by dissolved fossils are filled with mineral matter
C) Fine sediment encases plant remains, leaving behind an organic residue
D) Organic pores are filled with precipitated minerals
1. Permineralization
2. Cast and mold
3. Carbonization
4. Trace Fossil
Which of the following locations experienced the highest temperature increase during
the period from 1950-2014?
A) Australia
B) Contiguous United States
C) North Central Canada
D) Southeast Asia
What percentage of Earth’s land area is covered by dry regions such as deserts and
steppes?
A) 14 percent
B) 30 percent
C) 9 percent
D) 50 percent
Match the mineral class with the ion(s) it is based around.
1. Halides
2. Sulfides
3. Sulfates
4. Carbonates
5. Silicates
A) SiO2
4-
B) S-
C) Cl-, F-, Br-
D) CO3
2-
E) SO4
2-
________ is an erosional method where meltwater penetrates fractures in subglacial
bedrock and freezes.
A) Plucking
B) Comminuting
C) Spalling
D) Abrasion
What is the definition of orogenesis?
A) Subduction of an oceanic plate beneath a continental plate
B) Ionic exchange between calcium and oxygen
C) Emplacement of metallic ores via hydrothermal metamorphism
D) Processes that collectively form a mountain belt
Southern California is famous for its wildfires, which are often exacerbated by the
Santa Ana winds blowing through the canyons. What mass wasting event will later
devastate the same fire-affected areas?
A) Mudflows
B) Rockslides
C) Slumps
D) Solifluction
What was the name of the supercontinent that formed approximately 1.1 billion years
ago?
A) Rodinia
B) Pangaea
C) Nuna
D) Baltica
Match the earthquake location with the year of the disaster.
A) 1964
B) 1886
C) 1995
D) 2010
E) 1811-1812
F) 1906
1. San Francisco
2. Charleston
3. Haiti
4. Kobe
5. New Madrid
6. Anchorage
What is the effective maximum range for carbon-14 dating?
A) 100,000 years
B) 70,000 years
C) 10,000 years
D) 13,000 years
In what ways are the Sierra Nevada Mountains and the Andes Mountains the same in
terms of mountain formation?
A) Crumpling of the continent through collision with another continent
B) Emplacement of batholiths
C) Extension of the continent through rifting
D) Downwarping of the continent due to crustal subsidence
Which of the following factors contributed toward the early increase in temperature in
the Earth’s interior?
A) Impact from planetesimals
B) Friction between landmasses
C) Friction between landmasses and radioactive decay
D) Radioactive decay and impact from planetesimals
________ is a technique where the decay rate of radioactive isotopes is measured and
used to determine the age of a geologic material.
A) Electron Capture
B) Radiometric Dating
C) Ion Exchange
D) Half-Life
Which of the following locations is an example of spontaneous subduction?
A) Mariana Trench
B) Peru-Chile Trench
C) East African Rift
D) Cascadia Trench
The central United States is covered with extensive deposits of loess. Where did this
loess come from?
A) Alluvium deposited during major floods
B) Rock flour from the braid plains of Pleistocene glacial streams and rivers
C) Decomposing sandstone from the St. Peter Sandstone
D) Weathering and erosion of western mountains
How would the angle of subduction of a tectonic plate influence the location of a
volcanic arc?
A) The steeper the angle, the closer the arc would form to the trench
B) The shallower the angle, the closer the arc would form to the trench
C) The steeper the angle, the further the arc would form to the trench
D) The angle of subduction doesn’t affect the location of the volcanic arc
After the arrival of European settlers on the Lower Mississippi, residents constructed
levees along the river to protect their homes and farmlands from periodic flooding as
well as to keep the channel open to navigation. Now, residents have problems with land
subsidence, wave erosion, land fertility, and increased severity of floods and hurricanes,
particularly in the Delta area of southern Louisiana. Why would the construction of
artificial levees result in these problems?
Can soils can be eroded from distant sources and deposited as soil in new locations?
A) Yes, they are made of sediments and can be transported like sediments.
B) No, soils develop in place through the complex weathering of sediments and other
materials.
C) Yes, the processes of transportation help to break down larger sediments to make
soils.
D) No, once a soil is created in a location, it cannot be weathered and eroded.
Movements along normal faults can produce alternating upthrown and down-dropped
fault blocks. What are the names associated with these blocks, respectively?
A) Synclines and anticlines
B) Domes and basins
C) Horsts and grabens
D) Left-lateral and right-lateral
How old is the oldest known mineral, a zircon crystal, on Earth?
A) 13.7 billion years old
B) 4.6 billion years old
C) 4.4 billion years old
D) 2.657 billion years old
A ________ describes the observation of successive changes in a laterally continuous
sedimentary layer that are visible and are interpreted as a result of many depositional
processes taking place over a large area.
A) transitional environment
B) facies
C) delta
D) turbidity current
Pyroclastic materials are generally associated with which type of magma(s)?
A) Basaltic
B) Andesitic
C) Rhyolitic
D) Andesitic and rhyolitic
E) Basaltic and andesitic
Which of the following researchers coined the term elastic rebound after the 1906 San
Francisco earthquake?
A) Charles Richter
B) Giuseppe Mercalli
C) Zhang Heng
D) H. F. Reid