Geological Glossary

Convergent plate boundaries

This image shows a slice through the Earth at a convergent plate boundary. This view illustrates just one of the ways that plates behave when they collide. In this case, one plate is pulled beneath another (subduction), forming a deep trench. The long, narrow zone where the two plates meet is called a subduction zone.

The fate of the colliding plates depends mostly on what type of lithosphere they are made of. Plates with thick, buoyant continental lithosphere behave very differently from plates with thin, dense oceanic lithosphere!