The Sea Floor
Running Water
- The channel of the Houston River is 20 meters wide and 5 meters deep. When the velocity is 10 meters/second the discharge is:
- 1000
- 1000 cubic meters per second
- 100 cubic meters per second
- If the discharge increases to 4000 cubic meters per second during a flood and the depth and width of the channel cannot change, the velocity will increase to:
- 400 cubic meters/second
- 40 meters/second
- 400 meters/second
- 40 cubic meters/second
- A dendritic stream pattern will tend to develop in:
- regions underlain by regularly-spaced joints or faults
- regions of fold mountain belts
- along the flanks of isolated volcanoes
- in regions of vertically-oriented or tilted sedimentary rocks
- in regions flat lying sedimentary rocks
- Point bars are deposited:
- on the inside of stream meanders
- on the outside of stream meanders
- on the bottom-center of stream channels
- at the base of watefalls
- in abrasion potholes
- As a river overflows its banks during flood, it drops much of its coarser-grained
load immediately, forming landforms called:
- deltas
- alluvial fans
- natural levees
- point bars
- backswamps
- As a river flows into a quiet lake and begins to form a:
- deltas
- alluvial fans
- natural levees
- point bars
- backswamps
- Which one of the following generally decreases downstream along the length of
a stream?
- channel width
- channel depth
- gradient
- water velocity
- load
Deserts
- Wind transports fine-grained sediments by:
- saltation
- solution
- suspension
- surface creep
- Wind transports coarse sediments by:
- saltation
- solution
- suspension
- surface creep
- In a desert, wind erosion is usually ______ important than erosion by running water.
- less
- more
- about the same
- Ancient sand dunes now preserved as quartz arenites, would be characterizd by an abundance of _________
- mud cracks
- graded bedding
- cross-stratification
- phenocrysts
- Most of the world's deserts are found in belts:
- along the equator
- in middle to low latitudes
- in middle to high latitudes
- in polar regions
Glaciers
- Which of the following depositional features would you look for to assess whether an area had undergone glaciation?
- horns, aretes or cols
- hanging valleys
- terminal moraines
- waterfalls
- all of the above
- Which of the following erosional features would you look for to assess whether an area had undergone glaciation?
- horns, aretes or cols
- hanging valleys
- striated bedrock
- waterfalls
- all of the above
- Active continental glaciation may produce world-wide transgressions lasting
several tens of millions of years?
- True
- False
- Which one of the following landforms could be formed by either alpine or
continental glaciation?
- arete
- hanging valleys
- col
- end moraine
- a cirque
- An arete is a product of:
- stagnant ice processes
- till deposition
- subglacial streams
- headward erosion by alpine glaciers
- a deposition from meltwater
- Elongate ridges of drift on the ice surface at the middle of alpine glaciers are
called:
- lateral moraines
- medial moraines
- end moraines
- terminal end moraines
- none of these
- The firn line separates the:
- zone of plastic flow from the zone of fracture
- zone of ablation from the zone of accumulation
- zone of accumulation from the zone of fracture
- ice terminus from the end moraine
- ice terminus from the terminal end moraine
Shoreline Processes
- The distance from crest to crest is the:
- wave period
- wave length
- wave height
- none of these
- The sequence of wave development is:
- sea, breaker, swell
- breaker, sea, swell
- sea, swell, breaker
- breaker, swell, sea
- The size of a wave is controlled by the:
- wind speed
- wind duration
- fetch
- all of the above
- During a transgression, barrier islands :
- migrate landward
- migrate seaward
- remain fixed
- enlarge rapidly
- Which of the following sedimentary rocks might you expect to find forming along a passive continental margin?
- arkose
- tillite
- litharenite
- quartz arenite
Geology of the Sea Floor
- The Gulf Coast of Texas is a
- active margin
- passive margin
- The west coast of Peru is
- active margin
- passive margin
- If there is a hot spot in the asthenosphere beneath Yellowstone, Wyoming, which way will the center of active volcanism appear to have moved in a million years?
- East
- West
- North
- South
- Melange deposits are associated with _______ plate margins?
- subduction
- continent/continent collision
- spreading centers
- transform faults
- Silica rich sediments characterize the deep sea floor. The silica could have come from
- volcanic debris
- life forms that live in the oceans
- neither of these is correct
- the first two are correct
- Turbedity currents can occur at both active and passive continental margins.
- True
- False
- The presence of "magnetic stripes" recorded in the oceanic crust reflects:
- reversals in polarity
- the rate of sea floor spreading
- variation in composition of the crust
- all of these
Return to the Physical Geology Home Page