continental crust

British  

noun

1. geology that part of the earth's crust that underlies the continents and continental shelves

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continental crust Scientific  

/ kŏn′tə-nĕn′tl /

1. See under crust

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Example Sentences

Isotopic geochemistry suggests the molten material came from Archean continental crust dating between 3.0 and 3.3 billion years old.

From Science Daily

That evidence points to the São Francisco craton, one of the oldest and most stable regions of South America's continental crust.

From Science Daily

Their combined results point to a far livelier early Earth, suggesting that widespread subduction and the growth of continental crust may have begun several hundred million years earlier than earlier theories proposed.

From Science Daily

Continental crust: The thick, buoyant type of crust that forms Earth's continents, distinct from the thinner oceanic crust.

From Science Daily

To test this, the team built computer simulations that recreated how the mantle and continental crust behave when stretched by tectonic forces.

From Science Daily