HYDROLYSIS:
The word HYDROLYSIS comes from the root words HYDRO, and LYSIS. Hydrolysis has to do with water directly. In hydrolysis, water from rain, flood, or a previous storm first gets to the inner layer of rock. It mixes with the chemicals, and the substance of the rock then changes, into a clay-like substance. Once it is like clay, it will absorb even more and more water, which will cause it to expand. It keeps expanding, and eventually the layer above it is pushed off the main rock, and it becomes it’s own, smaller rock. The falling of, layer by layer, is similar to exfoliation. The only difference is that exfoliation is that exfoliation is a type of mechanical weathering, and doesn’t have to do with hydrolysis, but rather erosion instead.