Pangea was a supercontinent that existed millions of years ago, bringing together nearly all of Earth’s landmasses. Its existence profoundly shaped Earth’s geological and biological history, influencing global climates and the evolution and distribution of life. The term “Pangea” originates from ancient Greek, meaning “all lands,” a fitting description.
How Pangea Formed
Pangea formed gradually over hundreds of millions of years, driven by the continuous movement of Earth’s tectonic plates. These massive pieces of Earth’s outer shell glide over the mantle, the semi-fluid layer beneath the crust. Over vast geological time, these plates converged, causing continental landmasses to collide and merge.
Pangea was not the first supercontinent, but it was the most recent and extensively studied. Its assembly began during the Carboniferous period, approximately 335 million years ago, as earlier continental units like Gondwana, Euramerica, and Siberia merged. By the Early Permian Epoch, Pangea was fully assembled, forming a distinctive C-shape across the northern and southern polar regions.
Life and Climate on the Supercontinent
Pangea’s size and geography influenced Earth’s climate and the life that flourished. The supercontinent’s vast interior was largely isolated from ocean effects, leading to extensive arid conditions with extreme temperature fluctuations. This created one of Earth’s most expansive desert systems.
Despite the harsh interior, distinct coastal environments supported diverse ecosystems. The supercontinent’s formation also influenced global ocean currents, with warm surface currents being deflected into higher latitudes as low-latitude seaways closed. Dominant plant life included vast conifer forests, while terrestrial animal life saw the rise of early dinosaurs and synapsids, which were predecessors to mammals.
The Splitting of Pangea
Pangea began to break apart during the Early Jurassic period, approximately 200 million years ago, marking the start of a new phase in Earth’s continental rearrangement. This breakup was a multi-stage process driven by rifting, where the Earth’s crust stretched and thinned. Mantle convection beneath the supercontinent is thought to have generated upward flows that initiated this fracturing.
The initial rifting formed new ocean basins, like the Central Atlantic Ocean between northwestern Africa and North America. Pangea first fractured into two major landmasses: Laurasia to the north (North America and Eurasia), and Gondwana to the south (South America, Africa, Antarctica, Australia, and India). These larger continents then continued to fragment into the continents we see today, gradually drifting to their current positions.
Scientific Proof of Pangea
Pangea’s existence is supported by multiple lines of scientific evidence. One compelling piece is the “continental fit,” where the coastlines of widely separated continents, such as South America and Africa, appear to fit together like a jigsaw puzzle. This visual match is even more precise when considering the continental shelves rather than just the visible coastlines.
Fossil distribution provides strong support for Pangea. Identical plant and animal fossils, such as the Glossopteris flora and the reptile Lystrosaurus, have been discovered on continents now separated by vast oceans, including Africa, India, Australia, and Antarctica. This widespread distribution of species that could not have crossed large oceanic barriers suggests these landmasses were once connected.
Geological formations also align across continents when reassembled into Pangea. Similar rock types, mountain ranges like the Appalachians in North America and the Caledonides in Europe, and glacial deposits on different continents indicate a shared geological history. Finally, paleomagnetism, the study of ancient magnetic fields preserved in rocks, shows that magnetic signatures in rocks on different continents align when positioned as they would have been in Pangea.