Geology In

How Could Surface Minerals Get in Diamonds Found in The Deepest Depths of The Earth?

Diamonds, Geochemistry, Geology, Tectonic 8:08 PM

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-3yFwtU27r-Y/YG3m8Q4g4KI/AAAAAAAAS8M/NiClbK81YwMWjjb7p91rk0pQg3up4XkLACLcBGAsYHQ/s1280/diamond_with_inclusion%2B%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="842" data-original-width="1280" height="420" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-3yFwtU27r-Y/YG3m8Q4g4KI/AAAAAAAAS8M/NiClbK81YwMWjjb7p91rk0pQg3up4XkLACLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h420/diamond_with_inclusion%2B%25281%2529.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>  Diamonds that formed hundreds of kilometers deep below Earth's surface contain traces of chemical reactions that took place on the bottom of the ocean. Diamonds that formed deep in the Earth's mantle contain evidence of chemical reactions that occurred on the seafloor. Probing these gems can help geoscientists understand how material is exchanged between the planet's surface and its depths. New work published in Science Advances confirms that serpentinite -- a rock that forms from peridotite, the main rock type in Earth's mantle, when water penetrates cracks in the ocean floor -- can carry surface water as far as 700 kilometers deep by plate tectonic processes. "Nearly all tectonic plates that make up the seafloor eventually bend and slide down into the mantle -- a process called subduction, which has the potential to recycle surface materials, such as water, into the Earth," explained Carnegie's Peng Ni, who co-led the research effort with Evan Smith of the Gemological Institute of America. Serpentinite residing inside subducting plates may be one of the most significant, yet poorly known, geochemical pathways by which surface materials are captured and conveyed into the Earth's depths. The presence of deeply-subducted serpentinites was previously suspected -- due to Carnegie and GIA research about the origin of blue diamonds and to the chemical composition of erupted mantle material that makes up mid-ocean ridges, seamounts, and ocean islands. But evidence demonstrating this pathway had not been fully confirmed until now. The research team -- which also included Carnegie's Steven Shirey, and Anat Shahar, as well as GIA's Wuyi Wang and Stephen Richardson of the University of Cape Town -- found physical evidence to confirm this suspicion by studying a type of large diamonds that originate deep inside the planet. "Some of the most famous diamonds in the world fall into this special category of relatively large and pure gem diamonds, such as the world-famous Cullinan," Smith said. "They form between 360 and 750 kilometers down, at least as deep as the transition zone between the upper and lower mantle." Sometimes they contain inclusions of tiny minerals trapped during diamond crystallization that provide a glimpse into what is happening at these extreme depths. "Studying small samples of minerals formed during deep diamond crystallization can teach us so much about the composition and dynamics of the mantle, because diamond protects the minerals from additional changes on their path to the surface," Shirey explained. In this instance, the researchers were able to analyze the isotopic composition of iron in the metallic inclusions. Like other elements, iron can have different numbers of neutrons in its nucleus, which gives rise to iron atoms of slightly different mass, or different "isotopes" of iron. Measuring the ratios of "heavy" and "light" iron isotopes gives scientists a sort of fingerprint of the iron. The diamond inclusions studied by the team had a higher ratio of heavy to light iron isotopes than typically found in most mantle minerals. This indicates that they probably didn't originate from deep-Earth geochemical processes. Instead, it points to magnetite and other iron-rich minerals formed when oceanic plate peridotite transformed to serpentinite on the seafloor. This hydrated rock was eventually subducted hundreds of kilometers down into the mantle transition zone, where these particular diamonds crystallized. "Our findings confirm a long-suspected pathway for deep-Earth recycling, allowing us to trace how minerals from the surface are drawn down into the mantle and create variability in its composition," Shahar concluded. The above story is based on <a href="https://carnegiescience.edu/news/deep-diamonds-contain-evidence-deep-earth-recycling-processes" rel="nofollow" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; border-radius: 0px !important; box-sizing: border-box; color: #004276; font-size: 14px; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;" target="_blank">Materials</a><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; color: #333333; display: inline !important; float: none; font-size: 14px; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"> provided by <a href="https://carnegiescience.edu/" rel="nofollow" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; border-radius: 0px !important; box-sizing: border-box; color: #004276; font-size: 14px; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;" target="_blank">Carnegie Institution for Science</a><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; color: #333333; display: inline !important; float: none; font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: start; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;">.

How Could Surface Minerals Get in Diamonds Found in The Deepest Depths of The Earth?

Diamonds that formed hundreds of kilometers deep below Earth's surface contain traces of chemical reactions that took place on the bot...

Scientists Create Crystal Stronger Than Diamond

Diamonds, Researches 6:43 PM

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-IdSF8YDv6kU/YGXqBGf0NaI/AAAAAAAAS7w/FxznrEwQuFIk-qYENQS0FDCPTJ8QfP3AACLcBGAsYHQ/s1245/Scientists%2Bhave%2Bmade%2Ba%2Bdiamond%2Bthat%2527s%2Bharder%2Bthan%2Bdiamond%2B%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="790" data-original-width="1245" height="406" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-IdSF8YDv6kU/YGXqBGf0NaI/AAAAAAAAS7w/FxznrEwQuFIk-qYENQS0FDCPTJ8QfP3AACLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h406/Scientists%2Bhave%2Bmade%2Ba%2Bdiamond%2Bthat%2527s%2Bharder%2Bthan%2Bdiamond%2B%25281%2529.jpg" title="Scientists Create Crystal Stronger Than Diamond" width="640" /></a></div>   Currently, diamond is regarded to be one of the hardest and most scratch-resistant natural materials in the world. Most diamonds found in nature and often used in jewelry display a cubic crystal structure, a repeating pattern of 8 atoms forming a cube with carbon atoms at its vertices. Each carbon atom forms four bonds with its neighbors, explaining the overall stability and hardness of the crystal structure. Nature's strongest material now has some stiff competition. For the first time, researchers have hard evidence that human-made hexagonal diamonds are stiffer than the common cubic diamonds found in nature and often used in jewelry. Named for their six-sided crystal structure, hexagonal diamonds have been found at some meteorite impact sites, and others have been made briefly in labs, but these were either too small or had too short of an existence to be measured. Now scientists at Washington State University's Institute for Shock Physics created hexagonal diamonds large enough to measure their stiffness using sound waves. Their findings are detailed in a recent paper in Physical Review B. "Diamond is a very unique material," said Yogendra Gupta, director of the Institute for Shock Physics and corresponding author on the study. "It is not only the strongest -- it has beautiful optical properties and a very high thermal conductivity. Now we have made the hexagonal form of diamond, produced under shock compression experiments, that is significantly stiffer and stronger than regular gem diamonds." Researchers have long wanted to create a material stronger than natural diamonds, which could have a variety of uses in industry. While many theorized that hexagonal diamonds would be stronger, the WSU study provides the first experimental evidence that they are. Lead author Travis Volz, now a post-doctoral researcher at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, focused his dissertation work at WSU on the creation of hexagonal diamonds from graphite. For this study, Volz and Gupta used gunpowder and compressed gas to propel small graphite disks about the size of a dime at a speed of around 15,000 miles per hour onto a transparent material. The impact produced shockwaves in the disks that very rapidly transformed them into hexagonal diamonds. Immediately after impact the researchers produced a small sound wave and used lasers to measure its movement through the diamond. Sound moves faster through stiffer material. Previously sound moved fastest through cubic diamond; in the lab-created hexagonal diamonds it moved faster. Each process happened in several billionths of a second, or nanoseconds, but the researchers were able to make the stiffness measurements before the high velocity impact destroyed the diamond. Stiffness is the ability of a material to resist deformation under a force or pressure -- for instance, a rock is stiffer than rubber as rubber will bend when pressed. Hardness is the resistance to scratching or other surface deformations. Generally stiffer materials are also harder, said Volz. While the researchers weren't able to scratch the diamonds to test hardness directly, by measuring the diamonds' stiffness, they can make inferences about their hardness. If the science advances to the point where lab-made hexagonal diamonds can be created and recovered, they could have a range of uses. "Hard materials are useful for machining capabilities," said Volz. "Diamond has been used for a long time in drill bits, for example. Since we found that the hexagonal diamond is likely harder than the cubic diamond, it could be a superior alternative for machining, drilling or any type of application where the cubic diamond is used." While the industrial advantages are clear, Gupta said it is still possible hexagonal diamonds could one day be used on engagement rings. Currently lab-made cubic diamonds have less value compared to their natural peers, but hexagonal diamonds would likely be more novel. "If someday we can produce them and polish them, I think they'd be more in-demand than cubic diamonds," said Gupta. "If somebody said to you, 'look, I'm going to give you the choice of two diamonds: one is lot more rare than the other one.' Which one would you pick?"  The above story is based on <a href="https://news.wsu.edu/2021/03/31/lab-made-hexagonal-diamonds-stiffer-natural-diamonds/" rel="nofollow" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; border-radius: 0px !important; box-sizing: border-box; color: #004276; font-size: 14px; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;" target="_blank">Materials</a><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; color: #333333; display: inline !important; float: none; font-size: 14px; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"> provided by <a href="http://www.wsu.edu/" rel="nofollow" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; border-radius: 0px !important; box-sizing: border-box; color: #004276; font-size: 14px; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;" target="_blank">Washington State University</a><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; color: #333333; display: inline !important; float: none; font-size: 14px; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;">. Original written by Sara Zaske.

Scientists Create Crystal Stronger Than Diamond

Currently, diamond is regarded to be one of the hardest and most scratch-resistant natural materials in the world. Most diamonds found in...

L.A.’s Biggest Quake Threat Sits on Overlooked Part of San Andreas, Study Says

Earthquakes, San Andreas, Tectonic 7:23 PM

<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-J08hYnthsgo/YF4IzyxflMI/AAAAAAAAS7Q/tFIe5RwuM7QH8-oFGJLA0c_7CRfPIO2-ACLcBGAsYHQ/s1230/Arrows%2Bpointing%2Bto%2Bthe%2BMission%2BCreek%2Bstrand%2Bof%2Bthe%2BSan%2BAndreas%2BFault.%2B%2528Uniform%2BCalifornia%2BEarthquake%2BRupture%2BForecast%2529%2B%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="632" data-original-width="1230" height="328" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-J08hYnthsgo/YF4IzyxflMI/AAAAAAAAS7Q/tFIe5RwuM7QH8-oFGJLA0c_7CRfPIO2-ACLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h328/Arrows%2Bpointing%2Bto%2Bthe%2BMission%2BCreek%2Bstrand%2Bof%2Bthe%2BSan%2BAndreas%2BFault.%2B%2528Uniform%2BCalifornia%2BEarthquake%2BRupture%2BForecast%2529%2B%25281%2529.jpg" title="L.A.’s Biggest Quake Threat Sits on Overlooked Part of San Andreas, Study Says" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Arrows pointing to the Mission Creek strand of the San Andreas Fault. (Uniform California Earthquake Rupture Forecast)</td></tr></tbody></table>  Part Of The San Andreas Fault Is Moving Way Faster Than We Previously Thought Scientists have pinpointed a long-overlooked portion of the southern San Andreas Fault that they say could pose the most significant earthquake risk for the Greater Los Angeles area—and it's about 80 years overdue for release. But there could be a silver lining. If their analysis is right, experts say it's possible that when a long-pre dicted and much more devastating earthquake hits, it may not do quite as much damage to the region as some scientists previously feared. "That's a significant reduction in risk for L.A. if this is true," said longtime seismologist Lucy Jones, who was not involved in the study published Wednesday in the journal Science Advances. The San Andreas Fault is a roughly 800-mile fracture that runs much of the length of California and is capable of producing a much-feared, massive temblor known simply as "the Big One." As the Pacific and North American continental plates move past one another, the southern San Andreas Fault carries about half the resulting strain from that motion, up to 25 millimeters (about 1 inch) per year. Eventually, that strain is released through earthquakes. Not every part of the fault carries that strain equally, though. In Southern California, the San Andreas Fault system is made up of many smaller "strands," and it's difficult for earthquake researchers to identify which parts of the fault system are most at risk of rupture. Case in point: the bouquet of fault strands—Garnet Hill, Banning and Mission Creek—that crosses the Coachella Valley. Scientists long thought much of the southern San Andreas Fault's slip occurred along the Banning strand and the Garnet Hill strand; the Mission Creek strand, they said, didn't take much of the strain at all. But the new findings turn that idea on its head. Kimberly Blisniuk, an earthquake geologist at San Jose State University, went looking for evidence that earthquakes had caused landforms to move across the surface. She found them at Pushawalla Canyon, a site along the Mission Creek strand in the Little San Bernardino Mountains. There, right next to the water-carved canyon, she saw a series of three ancient "beheaded channels"—long depressions in the desert that looked like they were once part of the original canyon before earthquakes shoved them aside. Blisniuk walked the area to get a better look at these telltale signs of ancient rupture. In each of the channels, she and her team dated the ages of rocks and soil. The oldest channel, which lay about 2 kilometers (more than a mile) away from the current canyon, was roughly 80,000 to 95,000 years old. The second, about 1.3 kilometers (less than a mile) away, was about 70,000 years old; and the third beheaded channel, about 0.7 kilometer (less than half a mile) away, was about 25,000 years old. Based on these three landmarks, the researchers calculated that the average slip rate for the Mission Creek strand was about 21.6 millimeters (less than an inch) per year. At that rate, they realized, it accounted for the vast majority of the strain along the southern San Andreas Fault. By contrast, they calculated that the Banning strand had a slip rate of just 2.5 millimeters per year. "I was really excited," said Blisniuk, who said it took years to produce the data needed to make a convincing case that the ancient channels did indeed once connect to Pushawalla Canyon. "The San Andreas Fault is one of the best studied faults in the world, and there's still so much we can do" to better understand it, she said. Because the southern San Andreas Fault is likely to experience ground-rupturing earthquakes at an average rate of one every 215 years or so—and because the last such earth-shaker in the southernmost section took place in 1726—we're about 80 years overdue, Blisniuk said. About 6 to 9 meters of elastic strain have likely accumulated along the fault since the last one, the scientists said—which means that when it finally releases, the ground will likely shift roughly 20 to 30 feet. Whether it takes a single quake, or many of them, to go that distance remains to be seen, Blisniuk said. The discovery "looks like it could be a landmark study," said Thomas Heaton, an emeritus professor of engineering seismology at Caltech who was not involved in the research. Jones, who was not involved in the study, is now retired from the U.S. Geological Survey. But in 2008, she led a group of more than 300 scientists, engineers and other experts to study the potential consequences of the Big One in detail. The result was the ShakeOut Earthquake Scenario, which predicted that a 7.8 magnitude earthquake on the San Andreas Fault could result in more than 1,800 deaths, 50,000 injuries and $200 billion in damage and other losses. The new findings could alter that scenario and make it less grim, Jones said. Here's why: The Big One can only be triggered by a massive rupture on a long stretch of the San Andreas Fault, something on the order of 200 miles. If that rupture ended up traveling along the Banning strand—as the ShakeOut model assumed—its east-west tilt would send energy into the San Bernardino Valley, the San Gabriel Valley and finally into the Los Angeles Basin. But if the rupture were to follow the Mission Creek strand, its more northwesterly orientation would divert some of that energy away from the L.A. Basin, sparing it some of the devastation. Ultimately, Jones said, "This is a piece in an ongoing debate and not yet completely resolved—probably won't be, until we have the earthquake." Heaton agreed. "It would almost be a surprise to me as a scientist if the real earthquake, when it happens, plays out in a way that's really close to what we imagined," he said. "The earth is always surprising us—it's always reminding us that we need some humility in this business." The above post is reprinted from © the Los Angeles Times

L.A.’s Biggest Quake Threat Sits on Overlooked Part of San Andreas, Study Says

Arrows pointing to the Mission Creek strand of the San Andreas Fault. (Uniform California Earthquake Rupture Forecast) Part Of The San And...

New Rock Type Discovered Beneath The Ocean

Geochemistry, Geology, ocean, Rocks 6:45 PM

New Rock Type Discovered Beneath The Ocean

A microscopic cross-section of the newly discovered type of basalt Picture credit: Exp. 351 Science Team Geologists have discovered a new ...

Here’s What a Metal Volcano Would Look Like

Geology, Researches, volcano 7:42 PM

<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-wlBPPBYH_KM/YFjIZykgfCI/AAAAAAAAS6Q/zI8bFEVVQncwXh9NBPoNpESoSbiPtIOKwCLcBGAsYHQ/s1362/Here%25E2%2580%2599s%2BWhat%2Ba%2BMetal%2BVolcano%2BWould%2BLook%2BLike%2B%25281%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="557" data-original-width="1362" height="262" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-wlBPPBYH_KM/YFjIZykgfCI/AAAAAAAAS6Q/zI8bFEVVQncwXh9NBPoNpESoSbiPtIOKwCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h262/Here%25E2%2580%2599s%2BWhat%2Ba%2BMetal%2BVolcano%2BWould%2BLook%2BLike%2B%25281%2529.jpg" title="Here’s What a Metal Volcano Would Look Like" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Metallic lava flow emerging from rocky lava. Credit: Arianna Soldati</td></tr></tbody></table>   When Volcanoes Go MetalA team of scientists is hard at work on an important project: Figuring out what a volcano made of metal instead of rock would look like. What would a volcano -- and its lava flows -- look like on a planetary body made primarily of metal? A pilot study from North Carolina State University offers insights into ferrovolcanism that could help scientists interpret landscape features on other worlds. Volcanoes form when magma, which consists of the partially molten solids beneath a planet's surface, erupts. On Earth, that magma is mostly molten rock, composed largely of silica. But not every planetary body is made of rock -- some can be primarily icy or even metallic. "Cryovolcanism is volcanic activity on icy worlds, and we've seen it happen on Saturn's moon Enceladus," says Arianna Soldati, assistant professor of marine, earth and atmospheric sciences at NC State and lead author of a paper describing the work. "But ferrovolcanism, volcanic activity on metallic worlds, hasn't been observed yet." Enter 16 Psyche, a 140-mile diameter asteroid situated in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. Its surface, according to infrared and radar observations, is mainly iron and nickel. 16 Psyche is the subject of an upcoming NASA mission, and the asteroid inspired Soldati to think about what volcanic activity might look like on a metallic world. "When we look at images of worlds unlike ours, we still use what happens on Earth -- like evidence of volcanic eruptions -- to interpret them," Soldati says. "However, we don't have widespread metallic volcanism on Earth, so we must imagine what those volcanic processes might look like on other worlds so that we can interpret images correctly." Soldati defines two possible types of ferrovolcanism: Type 1, or pure ferrovolcanism, occurring on entirely metallic bodies; and Type 2, spurious ferrovolcanism, occurring on hybrid rocky-metallic bodies. In a pilot study, Soldati and colleagues from the Syracuse Lava Project produced Type 2 ferrovolcanism, in which metal separates from rock as the magma forms. "The Lava Project's furnace is configured for melting rock, so we were working with the metals (mainly iron) that naturally occur within them," Soldati says. "When you melt rock under the extreme conditions of the furnace, some of the iron will separate out and sink to the bottom since it's heavier. By completely emptying the furnace, we were able to see how that metal magma behaved compared to the rock one." The metallic lava flows travelled 10 times faster and spread more thinly than the rock flows, breaking into a myriad of braided channels. The metal also traveled largely beneath the rock flow, emerging from the leading edge of the rocky lava. The smooth, thin, braided, widely spread layers of metallic lava would leave a very different impression on a planet's surface than the often thick, rough, rocky flows we find on Earth, according to Soldati. "Although this is a pilot project, there are still some things we can say," Soldati says. "If there were volcanoes on 16 Psyche -- or on another metallic body -- they definitely wouldn't look like the steep-sided Mt. Fuji, an iconic terrestrial volcano. Instead, they would probably have gentle slopes and broad cones. That's how an iron volcano would be built -- thin flows that expand over longer distances."   The above story is based on <a href="https://news.ncsu.edu/2021/03/when-volcanoes-go-metal/" rel="nofollow" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; border-radius: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #004276; font-size: 14px; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;" target="_blank">Materials</a><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; color: #333333; display: inline; float: none; font-size: 14px; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"> provided by <a href="http://www.ncsu.edu/" rel="nofollow" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; border-radius: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #004276; font-size: 14px; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;" target="_blank">North Carolina State University</a><span face=""Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; color: #333333; display: inline; float: none; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: start; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;">. Original written by Tracey Peake.

Here’s What a Metal Volcano Would Look Like

Metallic lava flow emerging from rocky lava. Credit : Arianna Soldati When Volcanoes Go Metal A team of scientists is hard at work on an ...

Geologists Discover Powerful 'River of Rocks' Below Caribbean

Geology, Tectonic 7:25 PM

<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Kn81uzRNtZM/YFN9YlwRlEI/AAAAAAAAS58/TvqcalXaqBcLG7dldkDTNYRYI7x7dR_XwCLcBGAsYHQ/s1179/geologistsdi%2B%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="925" data-original-width="1179" height="502" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Kn81uzRNtZM/YFN9YlwRlEI/AAAAAAAAS58/TvqcalXaqBcLG7dldkDTNYRYI7x7dR_XwCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h502/geologistsdi%2B%25281%2529.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">In this image, the warped amount of the surface is due to the opening of the Central American gateway that allowed hot material to flow through. (a) Before 8.5 million years ago, hot material was upwelling under the Galapagos from deep inside the Earth, but was blocked out of the Caribbean because of a curtain of subducting plate. (b) A gateway opened at 8.5 million years ago allowing the hot material to flow through. (c) Today, the hot material reaches midway between Central America and the Lesser Antilles, tilting up the bottom of the Caribbean sea by about 300 m (1,000 ft). Credit: University of Houston</td></tr></tbody></table>  New findings by the geologists call into question the theory that tectonic plates are driven by the weight of their sinking portions, with an underlying, hot layer serving as no more than a passive lubricant. Geologists have long thought tectonic plates move because they are pulled by the weight of their sinking portions and that an underlying, hot, softer layer called asthenosphere serves as a passive lubricant. But a team of geologists at the University of Houston has found that layer is actually flowing vigorously, moving fast enough to drive plate motions. In their study published in Nature Communications, researchers from the UH College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics looked at minute changes in satellite-detected gravitational pull within the Caribbean and at mantle tomography images -- similar to a CAT Scan -- of the asthenosphere under the Caribbean. They found a hot "river of rocks" being squeezed from the Pacific Ocean through a gateway under Central America and reaching to the middle of the Caribbean Sea. This underground "river of rocks" started flowing eight million years ago, when the Central American gateway opened, uplifting the overlying seafloor by several hundred feet and tilting it to the northeast toward the Lesser Antilles. "Without the extra support generated by this flow in the asthenosphere, portions of Central America would still be below sea level. The Atlantic and the Pacific Oceans would be connected without a need for the Panama Canal," said study co-author Lorenzo Colli, assistant professor of geophysics, geodynamics and mantle structure in the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences. The findings have implications for understanding the shape of the Earth's surface, of its evolution over time through the appearance and disappearance of shallows seas, low-lying land bridges and the forces that move tectonic plates and cause earthquakes. Another fascinating discovery, according to the researchers, is the asthenosphere is moving six inches per year, which is three times faster than an average plate. It can move independently from the overlying plates and drag them in a different direction. "This challenges the top-down notion that subduction is always the driver," explained Jonny Wu, study co-author and assistant professor of structural geology, tectonics and mantle structure. "Think of the plates moving like an air hockey puck and being lubricated from below. Instead, what we found is the air hockey table is imposing its own currents on the puck that's moving around, creating a bottom-up movement that has not been well recognized, and that's being quantified here." The above story is based on <a href="https://uh.edu/news-events/stories/2021/march-2021/03112021-geologists-discover-river-of-rocks-below-caribbean.php" rel="nofollow" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; border-radius: 0px !important; box-sizing: border-box; color: #004276; font-size: 14px; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;" target="_blank">Materials</a><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; color: #333333; display: inline !important; float: none; font-size: 14px; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"> provided by <a href="http://www.uh.edu/" rel="nofollow" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; border-radius: 0px !important; box-sizing: border-box; color: #004276; font-size: 14px; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;" target="_blank">University of Houston</a><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; color: #333333; display: inline !important; float: none; font-size: 14px; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;">. Original written by Sara Tubbs.

Geologists Discover Powerful 'River of Rocks' Below Caribbean

In this image, the warped amount of the surface is due to the opening of the Central American gateway that allowed hot material to flow thro...

47-Million-Year-Old Fly Found With a Full Belly

Earth History, Fossils 7:53 PM

47-Million-Year-Old Fly Found With a Full Belly

A 47-million-year old fossil belonging to a previously unknown species of fly was found at the Messel Pit in central Germany For The First...

Rock Rising From Below the Atlantic May Drive Continents Apart

earth, Geology, Tectonic 6:54 PM

<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-GaZ98hBVNSI/YE4xSfKKYGI/AAAAAAAAS5k/Hfr_lzqpkw4dChGcMi0gOZuPW1hkuXP6QCLcBGAsYHQ/s1224/Rock%2BRising%2BFrom%2BBelow%2Bthe%2BAtlantic%2BMay%2BDrive%2BContinents%2BApart.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="689" data-original-width="1224" height="360" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-GaZ98hBVNSI/YE4xSfKKYGI/AAAAAAAAS5k/Hfr_lzqpkw4dChGcMi0gOZuPW1hkuXP6QCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h360/Rock%2BRising%2BFrom%2BBelow%2Bthe%2BAtlantic%2BMay%2BDrive%2BContinents%2BApart.jpg" title="Rock Rising From Below the Atlantic May Drive Continents Apart" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Material rising from deep below the Mid-Atlantic Ridge may widen the ocean by a few centimeters every year. The ridge is visible in this false-color map as a light blue line through the Atlantic. </td></tr></tbody></table>   Hot rock surging from deep beneath the Atlantic Ocean may be driving the continents on either side apart. That’s the finding of a new study. An upsurge of matter from deep beneath the Earth's crust could be pushing the continents of North and South America further apart from Europe and Africa, new research has found. The plates attached to the Americas are moving apart from those attached to Europe and Africa by four centimetres per year. In between these continents lies the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, a site where new plates are formed and a dividing line between plates moving to the west and those moving to the east; beneath this ridge, material rises to replace the space left by the plates as they move apart. Conventional wisdom is that this process is normally driven by distant gravity forces as denser parts of the plates sink back into the Earth. However, the driving force behind the separation of the Atlantic plates has remained a mystery because the Atlantic ocean is not surrounded by dense, sinking plates. Now a team of seismologists, led by the University of Southampton, have found evidence of an upwelling in the mantle -- the material between the Earth's crust and its core -- from depths of more than 600 kilometres beneath the Mid Atlantic ridge, which could be pushing the plates from below, causing the continents to move further apart. Upwellings beneath ridges are typically thought to originate from much shallower depths of around 60 km. The findings, published in the journal Nature provide a greater understanding of plate tectonics which causes many natural disasters around the world, including earthquakes, tsunamis and volcanic eruptions. Over two research cruises on the RV Langseth and RRV Discovery, the team deployed 39 seismometers at the bottom of the Atlantic as part of the PI-LAB (Passive Imaging of the Lithosphere-Asthenosphere Boundary) experiment and EURO-LAB (Experiment to Unearth the Rheological Oceanic Lithosphere-Asthenosphere Boundary). The data provides the first large scale and high-resolution imaging of the mantle beneath the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. This is one of only a few experiments of this scale ever conducted in the oceans and allowed the team to image variations in the structure of the Earth's mantle near depths of 410 km and 660 km -- depths that are associated with abrupt changes in mineral phases. The observed signal was indicative of a deep, sluggish and unexpected upwelling from the deeper mantle. Lead author, Matthew Agius, a former post-doctoral fellow at the University of Southampton and currently at Università degli studi Roma Tre said: "This was a memorable mission that took us a total of 10 weeks at sea in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. The incredible results shed new light in our understanding of how the Earth interior is connected with plate tectonics, with observations not seen before." Dr Kate Rychert and Dr Nick Harmon from the University of Southampton and Professor Mike Kendall from the University of Oxford led the experiment and were the chief scientists on the cruises. The experiment was funded by NERC (Natural Environment Research Council, UK) and the ERC (European Research Council). Dr Harmon said: "There is a growing distance between North America and Europe, and it is not driven by political or philosophical differences -- it is caused by mantle convection!" As well as helping scientists to develop better models and warning systems for natural disasters, plate tectonics also has an impact on sea levels, and therefore affects climate change estimates over geologic times scales. Dr Rychert said: "This was completely unexpected. It has broad implications for our understanding of Earth's evolution and habitability. It also demonstrates how crucial it is to gather new data from the oceans. There is so much more to explore!" Professor Mike Kendall added: "This work is exciting and that it refutes long held assumptions that mid-ocean ridges might play a passive role in plate tectonics. It suggests that in places such as the Mid-Atlantic, forces at the ridge play an important role in driving newly-formed plates apart."  The above story is based on <a href="https://www.southampton.ac.uk/news/2021/01/atlantic-plate-tectonics.page" rel="nofollow" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; border-radius: 0px !important; box-sizing: border-box; color: #004276; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;" target="_blank">Materials</a><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; color: #333333; display: inline !important; float: none; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"> provided by <a href="http://www.southampton.ac.uk/" rel="nofollow" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; border-radius: 0px !important; box-sizing: border-box; color: #004276; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;" target="_blank">University of Southampton</a><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; color: #333333; display: inline !important; float: none; font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: start; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;">.

Rock Rising From Below the Atlantic May Drive Continents Apart

Material rising from deep below the Mid-Atlantic Ridge may widen the ocean by a few centimeters every year. The ridge is visible in this fal...

4.6-Billion-Year-Old Meteorite Is The Oldest Magmatic Rock Ever Found

Meteorite, Researches 7:20 PM

<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-uAtjHFAZkVI/YEpAZo23KcI/AAAAAAAAS5c/pmVaMCv_ickgooPZXohNJfkX7_5oG0bOQCLcBGAsYHQ/s1268/4.6-Billion-Year-Old%2BMeteorite%2BIs%2BThe%2BOldest%2BMagmatic%2BRock%2BEver%2BFound%2B%25281%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1268" data-original-width="1268" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-uAtjHFAZkVI/YEpAZo23KcI/AAAAAAAAS5c/pmVaMCv_ickgooPZXohNJfkX7_5oG0bOQCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h640/4.6-Billion-Year-Old%2BMeteorite%2BIs%2BThe%2BOldest%2BMagmatic%2BRock%2BEver%2BFound%2B%25281%2529.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Erg Chech 002 meteorite's large crystals suggest that the rock cooled slowly. </td></tr></tbody></table> A single meteorite crash-landed in the Sahara Desert in 2020. The 4.6 billion-year-old primeval rock is the oldest known sample that may hint at a distant baby relative of Earth. The first meteorite rocks have been recovered in Gloucestershire after they dropped to the ground from the dazzling fireball that was sighted over the UK and northern Europe at the end of last month. The black space rocks, the largest piece of which weighs nearly 300g and crashed down on a driveway in the Cotswolds town of Winchcombe, have been taken to the Natural History Museum in London for further study. Scientists are particularly excited because the rock, likely to become known as the Winchcombe Meteorite, is made of carbonaceous chondrite, a mixture of minerals and organic compounds including amino acids – the ingredients for life itself. While it is three decades since the last meteorite was recovered from UK soil, never before has this kind of rock been found in Britain. It is believed that only 51 carbonaceous chondrite meteorites have ever been found and identified across the world. <div style="width:100%;margin: 0px auto">
<script async src="//pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/js/adsbygoogle.js"></script>
<ins class="adsbygoogle"
 style="display:block; text-align:center;"
 data-ad-format="fluid"
 data-ad-layout="in-article"
 data-ad-client="ca-pub-1021498709184325"
 data-ad-slot="6157425841"></ins>
<script>
 (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});
</script>
</div> The rock, along with more fragments recovered from nearby areas, was located after scientists retraced the flight path of the fireball that ripped into the Earth’s atmosphere with a sonic boom that was heard from Ireland to the Netherlands on Sunday 28 February. Dr Ashley King, a researcher at the Natural History Museum, said it is “exciting for us because more this type of meteorite is incredibly rare but holds important clues about our origins”. The meteorite arrived at the museum in remarkably good condition, the scientists said, comparing it to the quality of samples brought back from space missions. “For somebody who didn’t really have an idea what it actually was, the finder did a fantastic job in collecting it,” he said. “He bagged most of it up really quickly on Monday morning, perhaps less than 12 hours after the actual event. He then kept finding bits in his garden over the next few days.” Experts said that the meteorite could provide unique information about the origins of the Solar System some 4.6 billion years ago, as well as where water and the building blocks of life were first formed. “Meteorites like this are relics from the early Solar System, which means they can tell us what the planets are made of,” said Professor Sara Russell. “But we also we think that meteorites like this may have brought water to the Earth, providing the planet with its oceans.” Shortly after the meteor fell to Earth, the UK Fireball Alliance released imagery and maps charting its likely path and saying objects would most likely be found on the ground in and around Cheltenham. At the same time, the alliance advised interested members of the public not to breach coronavirus lockdown measures in order to go looking for space rocks. The study was <a href="https://www.pnas.org/content/118/11/e2026129118" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">published</a> in PNAS.

4.6-Billion-Year-Old Meteorite Is The Oldest Magmatic Rock Ever Found

The Erg Chech 002 meteorite's large crystals suggest that the rock cooled slowly. A single meteorite crash-landed in the Sahara Desert i...