Wiktionary
n. (context geology English) any of several large pieces of the Earth's lithosphere which participate in plate tectonics
Usage examples of "tectonic plate".
We can study tectonic plate movements and all the aspects of exogeology in short periods of time .
There are no known tectonic plate boundaries in the area but a very ancient boundary may be lurking in the area.
In this case Frances thinks the ranges may be even older than Hans does, remnants of early tectonic or proto-tectonic plate movement.
Britain floated like a rocky raft in the stable centre of a tectonic plate.
Another part of the mystery: no one had ever explained why the northern and southern hemispheres were so different, it was the problem in areology, a solution to which might prove the key to explaining all the other enigmas of the Martian landscape, as tectonic plate theory had once explained so many different problems in geology.
Secondly, a collision buckles or folds the rock strata themselves, the upper strata being forced upward to form mountain ranges -- the northern movement of the Indian tectonic plate created the Himalayas -- and the lower strata buckling to create what are virtually subterranean mountains, folding the layered strata into massive domes and arches.
Much later, the Chilean coast became part of the evidence for `continental drift': we now think that these mountains result from subduction, as the Nazca tectonic plate slides underneath the South American plate.