The Earth’s lithosphere is made up of a series of plates that float on the mantle. Scientists think the convection of the mantle causes these plates to move triggering earthquakes, volcanoes, mountain-building events, or trench formation. These plates creep along at a rate of approximately five to ten centimeters (two to four inches) per year. These plates move in primarily three main ways. They slide past one another along transform (strike-slip) boundaries, they push against each other at convergent boundaries, or pull away in opposite directions at divergent boundaries. Each one of these interactions create different types of landforms. For example, the steady pressure of the Indian Plate and the Eurasian Plate built the Himalaya mountains and the Plateau of Tibet. The divergent boundary between the African Plate and the Arabian formed the Red Sea.Use this plate map layer to explore how the movement of the plates cause earthquakes, volcanoes, or shape Earth’s landscape.

This map layer features both major and minor plates, but excludes microplates. The data is from the scientific study by Peter Bird published in volume 4, issue 3 of Geochemisty, Geophysics, Geosystems and was translated into geospatial formats by Hugo Ahlenius and updated by Dan Pisut.

117 original plate boundaries from Esri Data and Maps (2007) edited to better match 10 years of earthquakes, land forms and bathymetry from Mapping Our World's WSI_Earth image from module 2. Esri Canada's education layer of plate boundaries and the Smithsonian's ascii file from the download section of the 'This Dynamic Planet' site plate boundaries were used to compare the resulting final plate boundaries for significant differences.

The global tectonics data compilation is a set of raster and vector data that are useful for investigating tectonics past and present. The datasets are useful on their own or can be used in GIS software, which includes the QGIS project file for convenience. The datasets include our new models for tectonic plate boundaries and deformation zones, geologic provinces and orogens. Additional datasets include earthquake and volcano locations, geochronology, topography, magnetics, gravity, and seismic velocity.

The global tectonics collection is suitable for research and educational purposes.

The surface of the Earth is broken up into large plates. There are seven major plates: North America, South America, Eurasia, Africa, India, the Pacific, and Antarctica. There are also numerous microplates. The number and shapes of the plates change over geologic time. Plates are divided by boundaries that are seismically active. The different plate boundaries can be described by the type of motion that is occurring between the plates at specific locations. Ocean basins contain spreading ridges where the youngest portions of the seafloor are found. At the spreading ridges magma is released as it pushes up from the mantle and new oceanic crust is formed. At subduction zone boundaries plates are moving toward each other, with one plate subducting or moving beneath the other. When this occurs the crust is pushed into the mantle where it is recycled into magma.Data accessed from here: https://www-udc.ig.utexas.edu/external/plates/data.htm

This feature service depicts the boundaries of the Earth's tectonic plates and major fault lines and areas.Tectonic plates are large plates of rock that make up the foundation of the Earth's crust and the shape of the continents. The plates comprise the bottom of the crust and the top of the Earth's mantle. The plates are most famously known for being the source of earthquakes.A fault is a fracture or discontinuity in a volume of rock, across which there has been significant displacement as a result of earth movement. Large faults within the Earth's crust result from the movement of tectonic plates.Feature service published and hosted by Esri Canada © 2020.Content Source(s):Plates, United States Geological Survey (USGS)Fault Lines, United States Geological Survey(USGS)Coordinate System: Web Mercator Auxiliary Sphere (WKID 102100)This work is licensed under the Web Services and API Terms of Use.View Summary | View Terms of Use This data is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 2.5 Canada License

The NLWv3 Tectonic Plates layer contains features are produced based on assigning each NLWv3 landform feature the topmost tectonic plate and then using ArcGIS's Dissolve geoprocessing tool to create multipart polygons representing the area of each of the topmost plates.Tectonic plates are the building blocks of continents and comprise the Earth's crust. Tectonic plates float, moving slowly in the outer layers of the Earth's mantle. Tectonic plates cover the entire Earth's surface and their respective movements creates three types of boundaries: Divergent: The plates are moving away from each other causing new crust to emerge. Such boundaries are usually referred to as rift zones.Convergent: The plates are colliding in one of two ways. The first is when the edges of both plates uplift to cause mountains to rise and the second is subducting where one plate slides beneath the other, causing it to rise. Transform: These plates slide past each other in opposite directions.The boundaries of tectonic plates are where earthquakes, most volcanoes, and rough mountainous terrain are produced. We evaluated the most recently produced digital tectonic plate boundary datasets. The NLWv3 compilation based is first based on Ahlenius and then we adjusted many of the boundaries to match more recent seafloor rift and landform boundaries. We also added the Sinai and Adriatic Sea plates. Ahlenius, H. 2014. World tectonic plates and boundaries. Accessed December 22, 2021. https://github.com/fraxen/tectonicplatesTectonic map of the world. Accessed April 5, 2022. https://www.datapages.com/gis-map-publishing-program/gis-open-files/global-framework/tectonic-map-of-the-world-2007.Bird, P. 2003. An updated digital model of plate boundaries. Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems 4 (3):1–46. doi: 10.1029/2001GC000252.Gaba, E. 2018. Tectonic plates boundaries World Map Wt 180degE centered-en.svg. Accessed June 2, 2022. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Tectonic_plates_boundaries_World_map_Wt_180degE_centered-en.svgHasterok, D., J. A. Halpin, A. S. Collins, M. Hand, C. Kreemer, M. G. Gard, and S. Glorie. 2022. New maps of global geological provinces and tectonic plates. Earth-Science Reviews 231:104069. doi: 10.1016/j.earscirev.2022.104069.

This layer shows the interpreted surface locations of active plate and microplate boundaries, in and around Te Riu-a-Māui / Zealandia. The layer was newly-compiled for, and is part of, the 'Tectonic map of Te Riu-a-Māui / Zealandia' 1:8 500 000 dataset.

A web application for use in explaining the global distribution of earthquakes and volcanoes and why they are located where they are - specifically designed for use with NCEA Level 1 Geography.Layers that can be turned on in this application:- Tectonic Plate Boundaries- Recent Earthquakes- Archived Earthquakes- Global VolcanoesStudents can export their maps to a PDF or screenshot their maps.You do not have to have an ArcGIS Schools Bundle to access this web application.

This map depicts one year of global earthquakes and plate boundaries. Click on an earthquake for details about that event. Data is from the USGS Earthquake Catalog.If you have questions about the table, read the documentation from the USGS.

The 'Major crustal boundaries of Australia' map synthesizes more than 30 years of acquisition of deep seismic reflection data across Australia, where major crustal-scale breaks have been interpreted in the seismic reflection profiles, often inferred to be relict sutures between different crustal blocks. The widespread coverage of the seismic profiles now provides the opportunity to construct a map of major crustal boundaries across Australia. Starting with the locations of the crustal breaks identified in the seismic profiles, geological (e.g. outcrop mapping, drill hole, geochronology, isotope) and geophysical (e.g. gravity, aeromagnetic, magnetotelluric) data are used to map the crustal boundaries, in map view, away from the seismic profiles. For some of these boundaries, a high level of confidence can be placed on the location, whereas the location of other boundaries can only be considered to have medium or low confidence. In other areas, especially in regions covered by thick sedimentary successions, the locations of some crustal boundaries are essentially unconstrained. The 'Major crustal boundaries of Australia' map shows the locations of inferred ancient plate boundaries, and will provide constraints on the three dimensional architecture of Australia. It allows a better understanding of how the Australian continent was constructed from the Mesoarchean through to the Phanerozoic, and how this evolution and these boundaries have controlled metallogenesis. It is best viewed as a dynamic dataset, which will have to be further refined and updated as new information such as seismic reflection data becomes available.

This report consists of a compilation of twelve digital geologic maps provided in ARC/INFO interchange (e00) format for the state of Oklahoma. The source maps consisted of nine USGS 1:250,000-scale quadrangle maps and three 1:125,000 scale county maps. This publication presents a digital composite of these data intact and without modification across quadrangle boundaries to resolve geologic unit discontinuities. An ESRI ArcView shapefile formatted version and Adobe Acrobat (pdf) plot file of the compiled digital map are also provided.

[Summary provided by the USGS.]

Help students visualise plate boundaries on a spherical Earth, rather than on a flat map. The model shows major plate boundaries, boundary types and highlights our own Indo-Australian plate.Ready to cut out and construct (tennis ball required). Assembly instructions included.Suitable for primary Years 5-6 and secondary Years 7-12

Global plate boundary data from the Homeland Infrastructure Foundation Level database.

the precise location and geometry of oceanic spreading centers and associated transform faults or discontinuities' boundary has fundamental implications in our understanding of oceanic accretion, the accommodation of deformation around rigid lithospheric blocks, and the distribution of magmatic and volcanic processes. the now widely used location of mid oceanic ridges worldwide, published by p. bird in 2003, can be updated based on recent publicly available and published ship-based multibeam swath bathymetry data (100-m resolution or better), now available to ~25% of the ocean seafloor, but covering a significant proportion of the mid-ocean ridge system (>70%).here we publish the mapridges database built under the coordination of cgmw (commission for the geological map of the world), with a first version v1.0 (06/2024) that provides high resolution and up-to-date datasets of mid-ocean ridge segments and associated transform faults, and follow-up updates that will also include non-transform offsets.the detailed mapping of individual mid oceanic ridge segments was conducted using gmrt (ryan et al., 2009) (version 4.2 for mapridges v1.0), other publicly available datasets (e.g., ncei, pangaea, awi), and existing literature. mapridges will be revised with the acquisition of additional datasets, new publications, and correction of any errors in the database.the mapridge database was built in a gis environment, where each feature holds several attributes specific to the dataset. we include three different georeferenced shapefile layers: 1) ridge segments, 2) transform faults, and 3) transform zones. the latest corresponds to zones of distributed strike-slip deformation that lack a well-defined fault localizing strain, but that are often treated as transform faults.1) the ridge segments layer contains 1461 segments with 9 attributes: area_loca: the name of the ridge system loc_short: the short form of the ridge system using 3 characters lat: the maximum latitude of the ridge segment long: the maximum longitude of the ridge segment length: the length of the ridge segment in meters confidence: the degree of confidence on digitization based on the availability of high-resolution bathymetry data: 1 = low to medium confidence, 2 = high confidence references: supporting references used for the digitization name_code: unique segment code constructed from the loc_short and lat attributes in degree, minute, second coordinate format name_lit: name of the segment from the literature if it exists2) the transform fault layer contains 260 segments with 4 attributes: name_tf: name of the transform fault according to the literature length: length of the transform fault in meters lat: the maximum latitude of the fault segment long: the maximum longitude of the fault segment3) the transform zone layer contains 10 segments with 4 attributes: name_tf: name of the transform zone according to the literature length: length of the transform fault in meters lat: the maximum latitude of the fault segment long: the maximum longitude of the fault segmentto facilitate revisions and updates of the database, relevant information, corrections, or data could be sent to b. sautter (benjamin.sautter@univ-ubs.fr) and j. escartín (escartin@geologie.ens.fr).

This story map tells the tale of Earth’s tectonic plates, their secret conspiracies, awe-inspiring exhibitions and subtle impacts on the maps and geospatial information we so often take for granted as unambiguous. But is it? We recommend you journey through this map on the trail we’ve manicured on the left. You will find yourself hovering over the Mid-Atlantic Ridge or swimming in magma deep within the Earth’s core. Have fun and we hope your voyage is fruitful!

This digital map database has been prepared by R.W. Tabor from the published Geologic map of the Chelan 30-Minute Quadrangle, Washington. Together with the accompanying text files as PDF, it provides information on the geologic structure and stratigraphy of the area covered. The database delineates map units that are identified by general age and lithology following the stratigraphic nomenclature of the U.S. Geological Survey. The authors mapped most of the bedrock geology at 1:100,000 scale, but compiled Quaternary units at 1:24,000 scale. The Quaternary contacts and structural data have been much simplified for the 1:100,000-scale map and database. The spatial resolution (scale) of the database is 1:100,000 or smaller.

This database depicts the distribution of geologic materials and structures at a regional (1:100,000) scale. The report is intended to provide geologic information for the regional study of materials properties, earthquake shaking, landslide potential, mineral hazards, seismic velocity, and earthquake faults. In addition, the report contains information and interpretations about the regional geologic history and framework. However, the regional scale of this report does not provide sufficient detail for site development purposes.

[Summary provided by the USGS.]

The USGS presents an updated model of the Juan de Fuca slab beneath southern British Columbia, Washington, Oregon, and northern California, and use this model to separate earthquakes occurring above and below the slab surface. The model is based on depth contours previously published by Flück and others (1997). Our model attempts to rectify a number of shortcomings in the original model and to update it with new work. The most significant improvements include (1) a gridded slab surface in geo-referenced (ArcGIS) format, (2) continuation of the slab surface to its full northern and southern edges, (3) extension of the slab surface from 50-km depth down to 110-km beneath the Cascade arc volcanoes, and (4) revision of the slab shape based on new seismic-reflection and seismic-refraction studies. We have used this surface to sort earthquakes and present some general observations and interpretations of seismicity patterns revealed by our analysis. In addition, we provide files of earthquakes above and below the slab surface and a 3-D animation or fly-through showing a shaded-relief map with plate boundaries, the slab surface, and hypocenters for use as a visualization tool.

[Summary provided by the USGS.]

NCED is currently involved in researching the effectiveness of anaglyph maps in the classroom and are working with educators and scientists to interpret various Earth-surface processes. Based on the findings of the research, various activities and interpretive information will be developed and available for educators to use in their classrooms. Keep checking back with this website because activities and maps are always being updated. We believe that anaglyph maps are an important tool in helping students see the world and are working to further develop materials and activities to support educators in their use of the maps.

This website has various 3-D maps and supporting materials that are available for download. Maps can be printed, viewed on computer monitors, or projected on to screens for larger audiences. Keep an eye on our website for more maps, activities and new information. Let us know how you use anaglyph maps in your classroom. Email any ideas or activities you have to ncedmaps@umn.edu

Anaglyph paper maps are a cost effective offshoot of the GeoWall Project. Geowall is a high end visualization tool developed for use in the University of Minnesota's Geology and Geophysics Department. Because of its effectiveness it has been expanded to 300 institutions across the United States. GeoWall projects 3-D images and allows students to see 3-D representations but is limited because of the technology. Paper maps are a cost effective solution that allows anaglyph technology to be used in classroom and field-based applications.

Maps are best when viewed with RED/CYAN anaglyph glasses!

A note on downloading: "viewable" maps are .jpg files; "high-quality downloads" are .tif files. While it is possible to view the latter in a web-browser in most cases, the download may be slow. As an alternative, try right-clicking on the link to the high-quality download and choosing "save" from the pop-up menu that results. Save the file to your own machine, then try opening the saved copy. This may be faster than clicking directly on the link to open it in the browser.

World Map: 3-D map that highlights oceanic bathymetry and plate boundaries.

Continental United States: 3-D grayscale map of the Lower 48.

Western United States: 3-D grayscale map of the Western United States with state boundaries.

Regional Map: 3-D greyscale map stretching from Hudson Bay to the Central Great Plains. This map includes the Western Great Lakes and the Canadian Shield.

Minnesota Map: 3-D greyscale map of Minnesota with county and state boundaries.

Twin Cities: 3-D map extending beyond Minneapolis and St. Paul.

Twin Cities Confluence Map: 3-D map highlighting the confluence of the Mississippi and Minnesota Rivers. This map includes most of Minneapolis and St. Paul.

Minneapolis, MN: 3-D topographical map of South Minneapolis.

Bassets Creek, Minneapolis: 3-D topographical map of the Bassets Creek watershed.

North Minneapolis: 3-D topographical map highlighting North Minneapolis and the Mississippi River.

St. Paul, MN: 3-D topographical map of St. Paul.

Western Suburbs, Twin Cities: 3-D topographical map of St. Louis Park, Hopkins and Minnetonka area.

Minnesota River Valley Suburbs, Twin Cities: 3-D topographical map of Bloomington, Eden Prairie and Edina area.

Southern Suburbs, Twin Cities: 3-D topographical map of Burnsville, Lakeville and Prior Lake area.

Southeast Suburbs, Twin Cities: 3-D topographical map of South St. Paul, Mendota Heights, Apple Valley and Eagan area.

Northeast Suburbs, Twin Cities: 3-D topographical map of White Bear Lake, Maplewood and Roseville area.

Northwest Suburbs, Mississippi River, Twin Cities: 3-D topographical map of North Minneapolis, Brooklyn Center and Maple Grove area.

Blaine, MN: 3-D map of Blaine and the Mississippi River.

White Bear Lake, MN: 3-D topographical map of White Bear Lake and the surrounding area.

Maple Grove, MN: 3-D topographical mmap of the NW suburbs of the Twin Cities.

This part of DS 781 presents data for faults for the geologic and geomorphic map of the Offshore of Pacifica map area, California. The vector data file is included in "Faults_OffshorePacifica.zip," which is accessible from http://pubs.usgs.gov/ds/781/OffshorePacifica/data_catalog_OffshorePacifica.html.

The Offshore of Pacifica map area straddles the right-lateral transform boundary between the North American and Pacific plates and is cut by several active faults that cumulatively form a distributed shear zone, including the San Andreas Fault, the eastern strand of the San Gregorio Fault, the Golden Gate Fault, and the Potato Patch Fault (sheets 8, 9; Bruns and others, 2002; Ryan and others, 2008). These faults are covered by Holocene sediments (mostly units Qms, Qmsb, Qmst) with no seafloor expression, and are mapped using seismic-reflection data (sheet 8). The San Andreas Fault is the primary plate-boundary structure and extends northwest across the map area; it intersects the shoreline 10 km north of the map area at Pacifica Lagoon, and 3 km south of the map area at Mussel Rock. This section of the San Andreas Fault has an estimated slip rate of 17 to 24 mm/yr (U.S. Geological Survey, 2010), and the devastating Great 1906 California earthquake (M 7.8) is thought to have nucleated on the San Andreas a few kilometers offshore of San Francisco within the map area (sheet 9; Bolt, 1968; Lomax, 2005). The San Andreas Fault forms the boundary between two distinct basement terranes, Upper Jurassic to Lower Cretaceous rocks of the Franciscan Complex to the east, and Late Cretaceous granitic and older metamorphic rocks of the Salinian block to the west. Franciscan Complex rocks (unit KJf, undivided) form seafloor outcrops at and north of Point Lobos adjacent to onland exposures. The Franciscan is divided into 13 different units for the onshore portion of this geologic map based on different lithologies and ages, but the unit cannot be similarly divided in the offshore because of a lack of direct observation and (or) sampling. Faults were primarily mapped by interpretation of seismic reflection profile data (see S-15-10-NC and F-2-07-NC). The seismic reflection profiles were collected between 2007 and 2010.

References Cited

Bolt, B.A., 1968, The focus of the 1906 California earthquake: Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, v. 58, p. 457–471.

Bruns, T.R., Cooper, A.K., Carlson, P.R., and McCulloch, D.S., 2002, Structure of the submerged San Andreas and San Gregorio fault zones in the Gulf of Farallones as inferred from high-resolution seismic-reflection data, in Parsons, T. (ed.), Crustal structure of the coastal and marine San Francisco Bay region, California: U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 1658, p. 77–117.

Lomax, A., 2005, A reanalysis of the hypocentral location and related observations for the Great 1906 California earthquake: Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America, v. 95, p. 861–877.

Ryan, H.F., Parsons, T., and Sliter, R.W., 2008. Vertical tectonic deformation associated with the San Andreas fault zone offshore of San Francisco, California. Tectonophysics, 429 (1-2), p. 209–224.

U.S. Geological Survey and California Geological Survey, 2010, Quaternary fault and fold database for the United States, accessed April 5, 2012, from USGS website: http://earthquake.usgs.gov/hazards/qfaults/.