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CAST — California Science Test Earth as a Planet — practice questions

Explore 21 free Earth as a Planet questions in CAST — California Science Test Science. Open each question or exercise to read its content, reference answers and available explanation.

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Earth as a Planet questions and exercises with answers

Showing questions 1–21 of 21.

Scientists work out the layered structure of Earth's interior mainly by measuring what?Read the answer and worked solution →The charged particles trapped in Earth's magnetosphere flow out from where?Read the answer and worked solution →Any rock that has cooled from a molten state is placed in which class?Read the answer and worked solution →What supplies the power that keeps Earth's crustal plates moving?Read the answer and worked solution →Almost all of Earth's weather takes place in which layer of the atmosphere?Read the answer and worked solution →Which gas makes up the largest share of the air at Earth's surface?Read the answer and worked solution →Free oxygen first built up in Earth's air as a waste product of which process?Read the answer and worked solution →What happened over the Tunguska River in Siberia on 30 June 1908?Read the answer and worked solution →New oceanic crust is created at rift zones. Where is the old crust destroyed?Read the answer and worked solution →Oceanic crust runs about 6 kilometers thick. How thick is continental crust?Read the answer and worked solution →The San Andreas Fault marks the boundary between which two plates?Read the answer and worked solution →Who assembled the case for drifting continents in 1920, without a mechanism to explain it?Read the answer and worked solution →Ozone sits near the top of the stratosphere and shields the surface from what?Read the answer and worked solution →Effects of the atmosphere that last through decades and centuries are given which name?Read the answer and worked solution →The great ice ages were primarily the result of changes in what?Read the answer and worked solution →Carbon dioxide warms Earth's surface because it absorbs which kind of radiation?Read the answer and worked solution →Earth was struck as often as the Moon, yet shows far fewer craters. What removed them?Read the answer and worked solution →A worldwide sediment layer from 65 million years ago is rich in which rare metal?Read the answer and worked solution →About 2 square kilometers of new ocean floor form every year. What does that rate imply?Read the answer and worked solution →The Tunguska body carried the punch of a 5-megaton bomb, yet dug no crater. What explains that?Read the answer and worked solution →Sort the layers by where they sitRead the answer and worked solution →

Worked practice questions

Scientists work out the layered structure of Earth's interior mainly by measuring what?

  1. Seismic waves passing through it
  2. Ocean currents flowing over it
  3. Sunlight reflecting off it
  4. Magnetic storms above it
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Correct answer: A. Seismic waves passing through it

1. No one can drill deep enough to see the inside of a planet directly. 2. Waves from earthquakes travel right through the interior and change speed in each material. 3. Recording those seismic waves at many stations builds a picture of the layers they crossed. 4. Nothing at the surface, such as ocean currents or sunlight, carries information from that depth. _Source: OpenStax Astronomy (CC BY 4.0), section 8.1 The Global Perspective_

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The charged particles trapped in Earth's magnetosphere flow out from where?

  1. The cold outer solar system
  2. The hot surface of the Sun
  3. The upper layers of Jupiter
  4. The core of our own planet
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Correct answer: B. The hot surface of the Sun

1. A magnetic field can only trap particles that are already moving through space. 2. A steady stream of charged particles leaves the hot surface of the Sun. 3. That stream is the solar wind, and Earth's field catches part of it. 4. The same wind also stretches our field out on the side facing away from the Sun. _Source: OpenStax Astronomy (CC BY 4.0), section 8.1 The Global Perspective_

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Any rock that has cooled from a molten state is placed in which class?

  1. Primitive rock
  2. Sedimentary rock
  3. Igneous rock
  4. Metamorphic rock
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Correct answer: C. Igneous rock

1. Rocks are grouped by the process that made them, not by where they are found. 2. Rock that cooled from a melt is called igneous rock, and all volcanic rock is igneous. 3. Sedimentary rock is cemented fragments, and metamorphic rock is altered by heat and pressure. _Source: OpenStax Astronomy (CC BY 4.0), section 8.2 Earth’s Crust_

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