Forget what you learned in school—Earth might not have seven continents after all.
From an early age, most of us are taught to recognize seven continents: Africa, Antarctica, Asia, Oceania, Europe, North America, and South America.
The study, led by Dr. Jordan Phethean from the University of Derby, argues that the traditional division of continents might not be as clear-cut as we think.
Dr. Phethean explained. Instead, these plates are still stretching and gradually pulling apart, suggesting that they remain part of a single, evolving landmass rather than two distinct continents.
Central to this research is Iceland, a volcanic island long thought to have formed about 60 million years ago at the mid-Atlantic ridge—a tectonic boundary between the North American and Eurasian plates.
However, the new study proposes a more nuanced view, emphasizing how this geological process supports the idea that North America and Europe have not yet fully separated.
This suggests that these regions are not isolated landforms as previously thought but interconnected pieces of a larger continental structure.