TORONTO – We may not feel the ground shifting below us, but Yale University geologists have predicted that in the next 50 million to 200 million years, the world’s continents will smash together to create one supercontinent they call ‘Amasia.’
Yale’s conclusion, which suggests the Americas, Eurasia, Africa and the other continents would join just over the North Pole, contradicts existing theories of what lies ahead for the Earth and its supercontinents.
Lead researcher Ross Mitchell and his colleagues analyzed the magnetism behind ancient rocks to estimate where their locations would end up on the globe over time while measuring how the Earth’s crust will shift continents that float on its surface.
Get breaking National news
Pangaea, which was the last time a supercontinent formed about 300 million years ago, was situated on the equator close to where West Africa currently sits.
The Earth’s land masses are constantly moving, and previous theories suggested that the next supercontinent would return to Pangaea’s location, closing the Atlantic Ocean like an accordion. After studying the geology of mountain ranges, another hypothesis that emerged was that the continents would reunite in the middle of the current Pacific Ocean.
But Mitchell’s models point to Amasia forming 90 degrees away from Pangaea, and right over the Arctic.
“First you would fuse the Americas together, then those would mutually migrate northward leading to collision with Europe and Asia more or less at the present day North Pole,” Mitchell said in a statement released by the journal Nature where his findings were published Thursday.
The first step would see North America and South America merging together and closing the Caribbean Sea while the Arctic Sea would also disappear as the joined Americas would connect with Asia, he told the BBC.
“Australia would continue with northward motion and snuggle up next to India,” he said.
Antarctica would be left out from the supercontinent, though.
In his study, Mitchell said his theory adds to a pattern: Pangaea formed at about 90 degrees to Rodinia, the Earth’s previous supercontinent, while Rodinia emerged at about 90 degrees to Nuna, another supercontinent that took shape about two billion years ago.
Comments