Pangaea
Sign in to savethumb|270x270px|Map of Pangaea around 250 million years ago, at the beginning of the Triassic Pangaea or Pangea ( ) was a supercontinent that existed during the late Paleozoic and early Mesozoic eras. It assembled from the earlier continental units of Gondwana, Euramerica and Siberia during the Carboniferous period approximately 335 million years ago, and began to break apart about 200 million years ago, at the end of the Triassic and beginning of the Jurassic. Pangaea was C-shaped, with the bulk of its mass stretching between Earth's northern and southern polar regions and surrounded by the s
AI overview
Pangaea was a supercontinent that formed around 335 million years ago from the merger of earlier continents and began breaking apart about 200 million years ago, eventually creating the continents we see today. Understanding Pangaea helps explain why the continents fit together like puzzle pieces, why similar fossils and rock formations appear on distant continents, and how Earth's geography and life have changed dramatically over geological time.
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Article
27 sectionsContents
- Origin of the concept
- Evidence of existence
- Formation
- Previous supercontinents
- Formation of Euramerica (Laurussia)
- Collision of Gondwana with Euramerica
- Formation of Laurasia
- Paleogeography
- Geography during the Carboniferous
- Geography during the Permian
- Geography during the Triassic
- Geography during the Jurassic
- Paleoclimate
- Interior climate
- Oceanic influences
- Monsoons and rainfall
- Post-breakup
- Life
- Mass extinctions
- Rifting and break-up
- Opening of the Atlantic
- Break-up of Gondwana
- Opening of the Norwegian Sea and break-up of Australia and Antarctica
- See also
- References
- Sources
- External links
thumb|270x270px|Map of Pangaea around 250 million years ago, at the beginning of the Triassic Pangaea or Pangea ( ) was a supercontinent that existed during the late Paleozoic and early Mesozoic eras. It assembled from the earlier continental units of Gondwana, Euramerica and Siberia during the Carboniferous period approximately 335 million years ago, and began to break apart about 200 million years ago, at the end of the Triassic and beginning of the Jurassic. Pangaea was C-shaped, with the bulk of its mass stretching between Earth's northern and southern polar regions and surrounded by the superocean Panthalassa and the Paleo-Tethys and subsequent Tethys Oceans. Pangaea is the most recent supercontinent to have existed and was the first to be reconstructed by geologists.thumb|The supercontinent Pangaea in the early Mesozoic (at 200 Megaannum|Ma)|270x270px
== Origin of the concept == thumb|left|upright|Alfred Wegener –1930 thumb|World map of Pangaea created by Alfred Wegener to illustrate his concept