Posted on 12/08/2010 12:01:06 PM PST by NormsRevenge
What may be a new outermost layer of the Earth's core has been found, geoscientists have revealed.
This discovery could help solve mysteries of the planet's magnetic field, researchers say.
The Earth's core is composed mainly of iron, divided into a solid inner center roughly 1,500 miles (2,440 kilometers) wide covered by a liquid outer layer about 1,400 miles (2,250 km) thick. Even though the bulk of the core is iron, researchers also knew it contained a small amount of lighter elements such as oxygen and sulfur. As the inner core crystallized over time, scientists think this process forced out most of these light elements, which then migrated through the liquid outer core.
Now geoscientists think they have detected all these light elements concentrated in the outermost parts of the core.
"Ever since core structure started to be studied, there were hints of structure there — that's why we looked for it," said researcher George Helffrich, a geologist and seismologist at the University of Bristol in England.
Seismic speed changes
To investigate the core, researchers monitored seismic waves that traveled through its outer layer. The waves were generated by earthquakes in South America and the southwestern Pacific Ocean, and were recorded using arrays of seismometers in Japan and northern Europe.
The speeds at which seismic waves traveled through the outer core at different depths suggest that its composition does not remain the same all the way through. Instead, the uppermost 185 miles (300 km) or so is a distinct structure, with the section nearest the boundary consisting up to 5 percent by weight of light elements.
"The seismic structure we found is hard to deny — the signal is obvious to the eye in the data that we used," Helffrich told OurAmazingPlanet.
(Excerpt) Read more at livescience.com ...
Wow. This could shake the field of Seismology to the... well, CORE.
Come on, we all know the earth is hollow!
“geoscientists have revealed”
Ha. Check the premise. Not “have discovered”, but “have revealed”, like “they knew all along, but they just decided to tell you now”.
That would be the creamy vanilla pudding layer.
yumm!
It would be the (political) science b/s layer. Miles thick.
MMmmmm... caramel and nuget...
Mmmmmmmm.
Just like ‘Tootsie Roll” or in mystic parlance, “As Above So Below”.
Oxygen and Sulfur...
Well that stinks.
... and impenetrable! :)
I always hated the tootsie roll commercials.
Everything he saw became tootsie roll.
Serious psychological issue theres.
Next thing you know, he’s chewing on someones arm.
The aliens living inside the hollow earth dispute this hoax.
It’s hidden in moochie’s caboose.
LOL
Well obviously, that's where our Global Warming went.
In foot note 436,it was noted that seismospectographic analysis of the new layer strata strongly hinted at a band of gold interspersed with silver and rubidium.
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