Meet Amasia, the Future Supercontintent that Combines America and Asia

North America, South America, and Asia will all combine into one supercontinent, Yale researchers say.

By Kathryn Hawkins. Posted on February 10 2012

Have you always wanted to go to Japan, but don’t like the thought of flying all that way?

Stick around for another 100 million years or so, you won’t have to: Researchers say that the Americas and Asia will all move together to combine and form one huge supercontinent, which has been dubbed “Amasia.”

Amasia wouldn’t be the first supercontinent: Earth was home to just one continent, known as Pangaea, during the era of the dinosaurs, and several other supercontinents have existed during the Earth’s history.

Supercontinents are created when continents slowly shift, due to the tectonic plates beneath the Earth’s surface. “The plates creep underneath the planet’s surface and are responsible for creating areas like “the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, where Iceland has formed, and areas such as that off the coast of Japan, where one plate rides over another,” says Neil Bowdler at BBC News.

Geologists at Yale say that eventually, Europe, Africa, and Australia will join the supercontinent too, leaving Antarctica as the only odd man out.

The possibilities are intriguing, but even your great-to-the-nth-power grandchildren may not see it happen. “I would be quite surprised if humans lasted long enough to see the next supercontinent come to fruition,” said Yale geologist Ross Mitchell. “The truth is that none of the present scientific community will be around 100 million years from now to test these models.”

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