These agents perform their function mainly upon the portion of the lithosphere which projects through the hydrosphere to form land, and the land is the main area of denudation.
These igneous rocks were consolidated either upon the surface of the lithosphere or in its interior.
Beginning with a portion of lithosphere composed of rock, it is found that rock is broken up by agents of denudation, as wind, rain, frost, rivers and sea.
Some of the most valuable substances constitute such a small proportion of the total mass of the lithosphere that they hardly figure at all in a table of the common substances.
Love has shown that the great features of the relief of the lithosphere may be expressed by spherical harmonics of the first, second and third degrees, and their formation related to gravitational action in a sphere of unequal density.
It seems, however, to be the general opinion that the configuration of the lithosphere is due simply to the sinking-in and doubling-up of the crust on the cooling and contracting nucleus.
When the ice-sheet had disappeared, then free radiation of earth-heat would be resumed, the depressed isogeotherms would rise, and a general warming of the upper portion of the lithosphere would take place.
From this point of view it is the lithosphere that is unstable, all changes in the relative level of land and sea being due to crustal movements.
It seems not unlikely, however, that as light increases we may be compelled to modify the view that all oscillations of the sea-level are due to movements of the lithosphere alone.
The portions of the lithosphere which have been carried down the farthest have received the waters of the oceans, while those portions which have been carried down the least have emerged as continents.
By their action upon the lithosphere they have produced a third envelope,--the mantle of rock waste.
The surface of the zone of the lithosphere that is saturated with water is called the water table, and though less accentuated it conforms in general to the relief of the country (Fig.
This medial depression upon the lithosphere was occupied by the intercontinental sea, the Ocean of Tethys.
It would seem that the lithosphere in its adjustment had selected these earlier sea basins with their heavy layers of sediment for zones of special uplift.
Apart from the surprising velocity of transmission of earthquake waves, the strongest argument for an iron core to the lithosphere is found in the magnetic property of the earth as a whole.
The chemical reactions which go on between the gaseous atmosphere and the solid lithosphere are accomplished through solution of the gases in water.
The lithosphere a complex of interlocking crystals.
Thus we see that the lithospherecan scarcely be regarded as a perfect spheroid, since in the course of geologic ages it has undergone successive departures from this original form.
Almost the entire area of the lithosphere is included either in the so-called continental plateau or platform, in the oceanic platform, or in the slope which separates the two.
Diagram to indicate the altitude of different parts of the lithosphere surface.
The above list will hopefully give you a few useful examples demonstrating the appropriate usage of "lithosphere" in a variety of sentences. We hope that you will now be able to make sentences using this word.
