Computational modeling shows that plate tectonics weren't necessary for early continents. The formation of Earth's continents billions of years ago set the stage for life to thrive. But scientists ...

Earth's first continents may have emerged from the planet's primordial oceans much earlier than we thought, just six hundred million years after the planet formed, new research suggests. The ...

The desert floor in Ethiopia looks fixed and ancient, but it is moving. Across the Afar region and down the East African Rift, the African continent is being pulled apart by forces deep below the ...