Earth’s continental crust may have begun forming hundreds of millions of years earlier than previously thought, Yale scientists say — and the reason will be obvious to anyone who has ever baked a cake ...

The Nature Index 2025 Research Leaders — previously known as Annual Tables — reveal the leading institutions and countries/territories in the natural and health sciences, according to their output in ...

The crusty conundrum carries fundamental implications. The thickness of continental crust — the part of Earth’s crust that forms land masses and continents — plays an important role in everything from ...

An artistic reconstruction of Earth during the Hadean eon (~4.5 billion years ago). Intense volcanic activity, heat from accretion, and frequent impacts kept the young Earth in a molten state. This ...

Earth’s journey through the Milky Way might have helped create the planet’s first continents. Comets may have bombarded Earth every time the early solar system traveled through our galaxy’s spiral ...

In 1981, scientists discovered one of the thinnest portions of the Earth’s crust — a 1-mile (1.6 kilometers) thick, earthquake-prone spot under the Atlantic Ocean where the American and African ...

Chris Kirkland does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond ...

Waves in Earth's mantle created by the rifting of continents may peel the planet's crust from below, feeding volcanoes in the middle of the ocean. When you purchase through links on our site, we may ...