Want to shake things up? Let's talk about earthquakes. To keep it simple, an earthquake is a violent and abrupt shaking of the ground, caused by movement between tectonic plates along a fault line in the earth’s crust. What exactly does that mean? I'll break it down for you. The Earth is made up of four basic layers: a solid crust, a hot, nearly solid mantle, a liquid outer core and a solid inner core. It sort of reminds me of an avocado. The solid crust and the top, stiff layer of the mantle make up a region called the lithosphere. The lithosphere isn’t a continuous piece that wraps around the whole Earth like an eggshell. It's more like a mix of giant puzzle pieces called tectonic plates. Tectonic plates are constantly shifting as they drift around on the slowly flowing mantle layer below. The edges of these plates are called the plate boundaries. The plate boundaries are made up of many faults, or cracks in the Earth, and most of the earthquakes around the world occur on these faults. The USGS has a cool map that shows where all of the recent earthquakes have occurred - I highly recommend it if you're into maps. Since the edges of the plates are rough, they get stuck while the rest of the plate keeps moving. When these edges get stuck, they build up a lot of energy. When the plate has moved far enough, the edges unstick and release all of that built-up energy as an earthquake. The energy radiates outward from the fault in all directions in the form of seismic waves. The seismic waves shake the earth as they move through it, and when the waves reach the earth’s surface, they shake the ground and anything on it. If you're close to the epicenter, which is the location on the surface of the Earth directly above where the earthquake starts, you'll feel more of a sudden shake - which is more like what you'd see on TV. If you're further away, it feels more like the ground is rolling underneath of you. I've felt this before and my bed felt like a waterbed for about a minute. If you want to learn more about other science topics, don't forget to subscribe or follow! Thanks for watching and see you next time on Science with Kyle. #science #earthquake #earthquakes #tectonicplates #earthscience #earth