Matching Earth's Spheres and Features

This question requires matching the four major spheres of the Earth with their defining characteristics. Let's break down each sphere and its corresponding feature:

Understanding Earth's Spheres

The Earth is typically divided into several interconnected spheres. The question focuses on four key ones:

• Lithosphere: The rigid outer part of the Earth, consisting of the crust and upper mantle.
• Hydrosphere: All the water on the Earth's surface, such as lakes and seas, and including water as vapor in the atmosphere and underground.
• Atmosphere: The envelope of gases surrounding the Earth, commonly known as air.
• Biosphere: The regions of the surface, atmosphere, and hydrosphere of the earth occupied by living organisms.

Analyzing the Features

Now, let's connect these spheres to the given features:

• Feature (i) Plant and Animal Kingdom: This directly relates to all living organisms, which constitute the Biosphere.
• Feature (ii) Made up of rocks and minerals: This description perfectly matches the Lithosphere, the solid, rocky outer layer of the Earth.
• Feature (iii) Various sources of water: This refers to oceans, rivers, lakes, ice caps, and groundwater, all components of the Hydrosphere.
• Feature (iv) Thin layer of Air: This describes the gases surrounding the planet, which is the Atmosphere.

Matching the Columns

Based on the analysis above, we can establish the correct matches:

• (a) Lithosphere matches with (ii) Made up of rocks and minerals.
• (b) Hydrosphere matches with (iii) Various sources of water.
• (c) Atmosphere matches with (iv) Thin layer of Air.
• (d) Biosphere matches with (i) Plant and Animal Kingdom.

Therefore, the correct matching is (a)-(ii), (b)-(iii), (c)-(iv), (d)-(i).