Physical Geology – Last Chapters Review Questions
Chapters 12,13,17
1. The percentage of Earth's water that is in the oceans is ____.
a. 100 percent
b. 97 percent
c. 93 percent
d. 55 percent
e. 50 percent
2. The percentage of the Earth's water that is fresh water and is not frozen is ____.
a. 5 percent
b. 3 percent
c. 1 percent
d. 0.65 percent
e. 0.01 percent
3. Flow in which there is no mixing between parallel layers in the water is known as what?
a. turbulent flow
b. outflow
c. intermittent flow
d. laminar flow
e. stream flow
4. The primary factor that determines whether water moves by turbulent or laminar flow is ____.
a. discharge
b. gradient
c. velocity
d. area
e. none of these
5. A stream erodes material from its banks and bed by ____.
a. suspension
b. hydraulic action
c. abrasion
d. suspension and hydraulic action
e. hydraulic action and abrasion
6. What do the solid particles of a stream include?
a. bed load
b. suspended load
c. solution load
d. bed load and suspended load
e. suspended load and solution load
7. Streams do most of their erosion, transportation of sediment, and deposition of sediment during ____.
a. day-to-day flow movement
b. icy winters
c. flooding
d. rainstorms
e. wind storms
8. A delta with long, fingerlike sand bodies, each deposited in a distributary channel that progrades far
seaward, such as the Mississippi River, is typically formed as a(n) ____-dominated delta.
a. avian
b. stream
c. wave
d. tide
e. sediment
9. A delta that has islands reworked by waves on the seaward side, such as the Nile delta, is typically
formed as a(n) ____-dominated delta.
a. avian
b. stream
c. wave
d. tide
e. sediment
10. The Mississippi Delta is a good example of a
a. tide-dominated delta.
b. distributary channel.
c. stream-dominated delta.
d. mixed delta.
11. To predict floods, scientists
a. monitor a stream’s water levels.
b. evaluate a stream’s past behavior.
c. assume the same behavior as last year.
d. monitor water levels and evaluate past behavior for a stream.
12. What is the ultimate base level for a stream?
a. sea level
b. the nearest lake
c. the nearest stream
d. the nearest spring
e. the nearest valley
13. When a stream’s equilibrium profile shows a delicate balance among gradient, discharge, flow
velocity, channel shape and sediment load the stream is
a. superposed.
b. incised.
c. graded.
d. divided.
14. In all types of power plants
a. potential energy converts to kinetic energy to generate electricity.
b. a spinning turbine connected to a generator containing a coil of wire produces electricity.
c. fossil fuels are burned to generate electricity.
d. water is heated to generate steam, which turns turbines and generates electricity.
15. Headward erosion cuts through a drainage divide and diverts part of the drainage to another stream.
This process is called
a. stream erosion.
b. stream piracy.
c. downcutting.
d. stream terracing.
16. Which of the following is most porous?
a. sand
b. soil
c. gravel
d. silt
e. clay
17. Which of the following is most permeable?
a. sand
b. soil
c. gravel
d. silt
e. clay
18. An example of a rock/sediment type which could be an effective aquiclude is ____.
a. quartz sandstone
b. fractured granite
c. gravel
d. shale
e. graywacke
19. In regions of moderate to high rainfall, the top of a stream is the same as the ____.
a. top of the zone of aeration
b. top of the zone of saturation
c. bottom of the aquifer
d. bottom of the zone of aeration
e. top of the water table
20. What is the average rate of groundwater flow?
a. a few kilometers a day
b. a few meters a day
c. a few centimeters a day
d. a few millimeters a day
e. imperceptible
21. Where does groundwater discharge naturally?
a. only in the ocean
b. only in springs
c. only in streams
d. only in aquifers
e. wherever the groundwater table intersects the ground surface
22. A local aquiclude within a larger aquifer results in a(n) ____.
a. cone of depression
b. perched water table
c. artesian aquifer
d. zone of aeration
e. zone of saturation
23. States in which there is extensive karst topography include which of the following?
a. Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and West Virginia
b. Florida, Kentucky, Tennessee, Indiana, and Missouri
c. Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, and Kansas
d. Wyoming, Arizona, Colorado, and Utah
e. Michigan, New York, and Ohio
24. What conditions are needed for the development of karst topography?
a. humid climate
b. arid climate
c. carbonate bedrock at a shallow depth
d. humid climate and carbonate bedrock at a shallow depth
e. all of these
25. What is the general term for deposits of calcite and/or aragonite within caves?
a. stalactites
b. stalagmites
c. spears
d. dripstone
e. calcite-stone
26. Groundwater erupting from geysers that contain dissolved calcium carbonate will form deposits of
what?
a. stalactites
b. stalagmites
c. travertine
d. quartz
e. sulfides
27. Groundwater in an aquifer is sometimes called fossil water because
a. the water has been in the aquifer for thousands of years.
b. the water is not being replenished at anywhere near the same rate as when it formed.
c. tiny microorganisms living in the aquifer are living fossils.
d. the water has been in the aquifer for a long time and is not being rapidly replenished.
28. What is a natural fountain that intermittently ejects hot water and steam into the air?
a. hot spring
b. volcano
c. hydrothermal vent
d. geyser
e. aquiclude
29. What is the heat source for hydrothermal activity on land?
a. earthquake faults
b. recent or current volcanic activity
c. deep heat in Earth's interior
d. earthquake faults and recent or current volcanic activity
e. recent or current volcanic activity and deep heat in Earth’s interior
30. The maximum level of arsenic permitted in drinking water by the U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency is
a. 10 parts per million
b. 10%
c. 0.010 parts per million
d. 1%
31. What is the approximate length of time preserved in Grand Canyon rocks?
a. 10,000 years
b. 100,000 years
c. 1 million years
d. 1 billion years
e. 10 billion years
32. Once the concept of a linear time and history were established, the earliest estimates of Earth's age
were based on ____.
a. inference from the Bible
b. inference from the rates of observable geologic processes
c. direct statements from the Bible
d. faith
e. none of these
33. What is the age of the Earth?
a. 12.6 billion years
b. 12.6 million years
c. 4.6 billion years
d. 4.6 million years
e. 10,000 years
34. Whose work was the basis for the principle of uniformitarianism and the unavoidable necessity of a
great age for Earth?
a. Charles Lyell
b. William Smith
c. James Hutton
d. Lord Kelvin
e. John Joly
35. Who, by virtue of a mathematical model, concluded that Earth could not be older than 100 million
years and no younger than 20 million years?
a. Charles Lyell
b. William Smith
c. James Hutton
d. Lord Kelvin
e. John Joly
36. A surface of erosion on metamorphic or igneous rocks, below sedimentary rocks is a(n) ____.
a. nonconformity
b. disconformity
c. angular unconformity
d. anticonformity
e. none of these
37. What principle states that in an undisturbed succession of sedimentary rocks, the oldest layer is at the
bottom and the youngest is at the top?
a. principle of cross-cutting relationships
b. principle of inclusions
c. principle of fossil succession
d. principle of uniformitarianism
e. principle of superposition
38. What principle states that fragments of one rock contained within another rock are older than the
containing rock?
a. principle of cross-cutting relationships
b. principle of inclusions
c. principle of fossil succession
d. principle of uniformitarianism
e. principle of superposition
39. Which principle states that fossil assemblages succeed one another through time in a regular and
predictable order?
a.
b.
c.
d.
e.
principle of cross-cutting relationships
principle of inclusions
principle of fossil succession
principle of uniformitarianism
principle of superposition
40. The time equivalence of strata is determined by ____.
a. correlation of unusual lithologies
b. correlation of key beds
c. correlation of fossils
d. lateral tracing
e. superposition
41. What is the loss of two protons and two neutrons from the nucleus called?
a. alpha decay
b. beta decay
c. electron decay
d. electron capture
e. half-life decay
42. If an isotope has a half-life of 50 million years, and 1/8 of the sample remaining consists of that
isotope, what is the age of the rock from which it was taken?
a. 400 million years
b. 300 million years
c. 150 million years
d. 800 million years
e. none of these
43. Sources of uncertainty in radioactive dating do not include ____.
a. loss of daughter isotope
b. uncertainty in decay constants
c. experimental and sample error
d. addition of parent isotope
e. questions about metamorphism
44. What is the maximum age limit for radiocarbon dating of fossils?
a. 70,000 years
b. 700,000 years
c. 7 million years
d. 70 million years
e. 700 million years
45. The geologic time scale was initially put together by
a. radiometric dating and correlation.
b. superposition, fossil succession and correlation.
c. lithostratigraphy and biostratigraphy.
d. carbon-14 age dating and lithostratigraphy.
46. Stalagmites can be radiometrically dated because
a. like tree rings, the calcium carbonate layers vary in thickness by year.
b. carbon-14 decays to nitrogen 14 in the carbonate.
c. uranium-234 substitutes for calcium and decays to thorium-230.
d. fission tracks in apatite in the structures can be dated.
47. Climate changes in a region because
a. continents are carried to different latitudes.
b. continental movement affects ocean circulation patterns.
c. continental movement affects atmospheric circulation patterns.
d. all of these.