How is relief determined

On this map, there are no exact elevations or locations for the highest and lowest points! All you know is that the location of the highest point on the map must be inside the ' contour, and its elevation must be more than ' and less than '. The lowest point must be located outside the ' contour and its elevation must be less than ' but more than '. So, along profile A-B, the points marked in red where the contours cross the line of profile are the only points whose elevations are known. Not only is the clay worn away because it is soft, but it is worn away even more rapidly because it is impermeable too.

Sometimes the structure of the rocks is important in determining relief. Between about 15 and 35 million years ago, when the African Plate pushed against the European Plate, a high mountain chain, the Alps, was pushed up in France, Switzerland, Austria and Italy.

The North and South Downs originally formed one flat sheet of chalk that stretched across south-eastern England. However, Alpine mountain building pushed it up into a large fold called an anticline. The weakened chalk in the anticline was eroded away, leaving two chains of hills on its sides the North and South Downs. Discovering Geology introduces a range of geoscience topics to school-age students and learners of all ages. Planet Earth is dynamic with a surface that is always changing.

Find out about the processes that cause these changes. Erosion involves the movement of rock fragments through gravity, wind, rain, rivers, oceans and glaciers. Home » Discovering Geology » Geological processes » Relief.

Relief Discovering Geology — Geological processes. You may also be interested in. Discovering Geology Discovering Geology introduces a range of geoscience topics to school-age students and learners of all ages.

The map below shows much more detail about Michigan's relief. It is called a "relief-like" map, since it uses various colors and shading to shows areas of different elevation, and some shadowing to highlight steep slopes.

Note the Superior Upland in the western UP, and the upland plateau in the north-central lower peninsula. Note also that most of the rest of the state is a generally low-relief landscape. In GEO we will spend some time, however, examining the subtleties of the Michigan landscape--it's not all flat!