The earth's core is a thousand degrees hotter than previously thought - Science in Poland (PAP)

temperature of the Earth is six thousand. degrees C. That’s about a thousand more than the experiments have shown 20 years ago – we read in “Science”.

Earth’s core consists mainly of iron sphere with a temperature above 4000 ° C and a pressure of more than 1.3 million atmospheres. Under these conditions, the iron is present there as liquid as water in the oceans. So extreme conditions prevail but only in the very center of the Earth, where pressure and temperature are even higher, and takes the form of a solid iron. Thickness of the solid and the liquid part of the Earth’s core, scientists know through analysis of seismic waves generated during earthquakes occasion, passing through our planet. We also, as with the depth increases the pressure within the Earth. The study, however, did not allow the waves to meet the temperatures.

Scientists have long tried to determine how the iron core of the Earth behaves under extreme conditions of temperature and pressure. Many previous studies in this direction, however, gave conflicting results.

This time Simone Anzellini the Commissariat a l’Energie Atomiquewe France and her colleagues simulated the melting behavior of metallic iron in the Earth’s core. The researchers studied the iron, subjecting them to pressure reaching 200 Gigapascals (equal to approximately 2 million atmospheres). This corresponds to a pressure which prevails in the top one-quarter of the Earth’s core. So extreme conditions can be obtained using a device called a diamond-vice, energized by a laser. Using x-ray diffraction spying or changes that in such extreme conditions can occur in an iron core.

results obtained in the laboratory Anzellini and her colleagues have moved on a scale comparable to the real economy. Thus tagged iron temperature when it melts in the inner core of the Earth within the (border between the internal solid – liquid and the outer part of the core).

According to them, there is

temperature there about 6 thousand. ° C – much higher than suggested by the conventional estimates. The result agrees with recent calculations carried out by experts in the field of quantum mechanics.

new results will help narrow down the possible range of temperatures in the Earth’s core. Knowledge of the processes prevailing there helps to better understand the existence of the magnetic field. (PAP)

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