system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
Do Tectonic plates ever change in size and or break apart?

Are the plates different now compared to the time of Pangea?
gpt
Yes.

Plates breaking apart is known as *rifting*, and is the process that creates new oceans with their ridges. For example Africa and South America were once on one plate, that then rifted about 100 million years ago, forming the South Atlantic Ocean between.

Plates can join together as a result of continental collisions. The join is known as a *suture*. An example is the Iapetus Suture which runs through eastern North America, Ireland, and Great Britain, marking where the Iapetus Ocean closed around 400 million years ago; England and Scotland were once on two seperate tectonic plates before they joined along that suture.