noun
A long, narrow fissure in the earth marking a zone of the lithosphere that has become thinner because tectonic plates underlying the region have moved away from one other.
continental rift
continental riftTHE AMERICAN HERITAGE® DICTIONARY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE, FIFTH EDITION by the Editors of the American Heritage Dictionaries. Copyright © 2016, 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
Link to this page
Cite this page
MLA Style
"continental rift." YourDictionary, n.d. Web. 14 January 2019. <https://www.yourdictionary.com/continental-rift>.
APA Style
continental rift. (n.d.). Retrieved January 14th, 2019, from https://www.yourdictionary.com/continental-rift
A long, narrow fissure in the Earth marking a zone of the lithosphere that has become thinner due to extensional forces associated with plate tectonics. Continental rifts are thousands of kilometers in length and hundreds of kilometers in width, and they are associated with normal faults and with grabens.
Link to this page
Cite this page
MLA Style
"continental rift." YourDictionary, n.d. Web. 14 January 2019. <https://www.yourdictionary.com/continental-rift>.
APA Style
continental rift. (n.d.). Retrieved January 14th, 2019, from https://www.yourdictionary.com/continental-rift
