Geology of the Alps: How the alpine chain was created

The Alps form one of the world’s great mountain ranges, with a variety and intensity of geology, scenery and plant life that enthralls millions.
Defining just where the Alps begin and end is rather arbitrary. The Alps are in fact part of a wider chain of mountain ranges running from the Pyrenees, the Betic Cordillera in Spain and the north African Atlas mountains in the west, via the Alps themselves, to the Carpathians and Dinarides, and beyond into the Himalayas.
All these mountain ranges are relatively young (in geological terms) and were (and indeed still are being) created following the break up of a supercontinent, Pangaea, that existed some 250 million years ago (around the time of the dinosaurs).