EVSC 1010 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Debris Flow, Regolith, Carbonation

• School: University of Virginia
• Department: Environmental Sciences
• Course: EVSC 1010
• Professor: Smith Tom

Document Summary

Weathering is the decomposition and disintegration of rocks and minerals at earth"s surface. Erosion: removal of weathered rocks by water, wind, ice, or gravity. Weathering breaks it down and erosion moves it. Example: weathering loosens a quartz grain from granite. Rain erodes the grain, washing it into a stream. The stream transports it and finally deposits the grain on a beach. Mechanical weathering (physical weathering: reduces solid rock to smaller fragments but does not alter the chemical composition of the rocks and minerals, frost wedging. Water freezes and expands, exerting intense pressure on the rock further fracturing it, creating talus slopes: abrasion. Rounded rocks in a streambed rocks have been tumbled against each other. Water abrasion wave action eroding rocks: biological activity. Tree growing from crack in bedrock growing widening the crack. Dissolves or breaks down minerals in rocks. Caverns form when ground water dissolves limestone: oxidation. Changes the mineral composition of the rock.