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Glite Dictionary
geosphere

geosphere

7.7
The solid part of the Earth that includes the crust and upper mantle
  • noun
  • /ˈdʒiːəˌsfɪr/
  • Specialized
translation icon : geosfera
  • Pierre Teilhard de Chardin noted that, as the molten Earth solidified, it formed a geosphere.

Examples

  • The geosphere includes the Earth's crust and outer mantle, which are vital for understanding geological processes.

  • Scientists study the geosphere to learn how the planet's solid structure influences climate change.

  • The soil data are from the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme Data and Information System.

    Academic text (2004)

  • The environmental sciences, including geography, employ imaging technologies such as sonar to screen structures of earth, rock, and water and offer fine-grained maps of phenomena ranging from the geosphere to the atmosphere.

    Academic text (2018)

  • Geologists often explore the geosphere to find natural resources like minerals and fossil fuels.

Synonyms

lithosphere
vsgeosphere
  • Specialized
1 7.6

The hard outer part of the Earth made of the crust and the top of the mantle

is the broader solid part including crust and outer mantle and excludes atmosphere

How Deep

core
  • Specialized
130 4.9
mantle
  • Specialized
11 7.0
geosphere
  • Specialized
7.7
crust
  • Specialized
47 4.9
surface
3.4

Surface Forms

geosphere singular
geospheres plural

Morphology

geosphere = sphere (semi-transparent) = geo + sphere

The term is transparently built from 'geo' meaning Earth and 'sphere', but the scientific sense of the Earth's solid part is more specialized than the everyday meanings of the parts.

Etymology

Geosphere comes from the Greek parts geo meaning 'earth' and sphere meaning 'ball' or 'round object', as in geography or geology. So the geosphere is the Earth's 'ball' of solid rock, the ground and deep layers, not the air or the water.