The high temperatures and pressures of the Earth's mantle forge carbon-rich minerals known as carbonates into diamond. But less is known about the fate of carbonates that travel even deeper underground—depths from which ...
Earth Sciences
Mar 24, 2021
2
5628
Current understanding is that the chemical composition of the Earth's mantle is relatively homogeneous. But experiments conducted by ETH researchers now show that this view is too simplistic. Their results solve a key problem ...
Earth Sciences
Oct 21, 2020
0
1180
Earth's molten core may be leaking iron, according to researchers who analyzed how iron behaves inside our planet.
Earth Sciences
Apr 13, 2020
9
4334
Simulating the conditions 2,700 kilometers deep underground, scientists have studied an important transformation of the most abundant mineral on Earth, bridgmanite. The results from the Extreme Conditions Beamline at DESY's ...
Earth Sciences
Dec 17, 2019
0
124
Every school child learns about the water cycle—evaporation, condensation, precipitation, and collection. But what if there were a deep Earth component of this process happening on geologic timescales that makes our planet ...
Earth Sciences
Dec 17, 2019
2
151
Nearly 1,800 miles below the earth's surface, there are large odd structures lurking at the base of the mantle, sitting just above the core. The mantle is a thick layer of hot, mostly plastic rock that surrounds the core; ...
Earth Sciences
Sep 21, 2018
6
103
Scientists now have a clearer picture of the Earth's mantle, thanks to Michigan State University research published in the current issue of Nature Communications.
Earth Sciences
Apr 3, 2018
0
32
In the 1960s, some 50 years after German researcher Alfred Wegener proposed his continental drift hypothesis, the theory of plate tectonics gave scientists a unifying framework for describing the large-scale motion of the ...
Earth Sciences
Mar 29, 2018
0
92
When renowned University of Toronto (U of T) geophysicist J. Tuzo Wilson cemented concepts in the emerging field of plate tectonics in the 1960s, he revolutionized the study of Earth's physical characteristics and behaviours. ...
Earth Sciences
Nov 28, 2017
4
583
Plate tectonics has shaped the Earth's surface for billions of years: Continents and oceanic crust have pushed and pulled on each other, continually rearranging the planet's façade. As two massive plates collide, one can ...
Earth Sciences
Aug 22, 2017
1
37
