2021

Rock Crystals From the Deep Give Microscopic Clues to Earthquake Ground Movements

<p><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/-Axlgz1HjSdc/YPhWcU4-BHI/AAAAAAAATOI/f_locNcUy7cDwjpLJN3Rrl3e9l0PtjE2wCLcBGAsYHQ/s1149/rock-crystals-from-the%2B%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="540" data-original-width="1149" height="300" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Axlgz1HjSdc/YPhWcU4-BHI/AAAAAAAATOI/f_locNcUy7cDwjpLJN3Rrl3e9l0PtjE2wCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h300/rock-crystals-from-the%2B%25281%2529.jpg" title="Rock crystals from the deep give microscopic clues to earthquake ground movements" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Chunks of exotic green rocks from the mantle erupted from the San Carlos Volcanic Field, Arizona. Credit: James St John</td></tr></tbody></table> <br /></p><p>Microscopic imperfections in rock crystals deep beneath Earth’s surface play a deciding factor in how the ground slowly moves and resets in the aftermath of major earthquakes, says new research involving the University of Cambridge.<br /><br />The stresses resulting from these defects – which are small enough to disrupt the atomic building blocks of a crystal – can transform how hot rocks beneath Earth’s crust move and in turn transfer stress back to Earth’s surface, starting the countdown to the next earthquake. <br /><br />The new study, published in Nature Communications, is the first to map out the crystal defects and surrounding force fields in detail. “They’re so tiny that we’ve only been able to observe them with the latest microscopy techniques,” said lead author Dr David Wallis from Cambridge's Department of Earth Sciences, “But it’s clear that they can significantly influence how deep rocks move, and even govern when and where the next earthquake will happen.”<br /><br />By understanding how these crystal defects influence rocks in the Earth’s upper mantle, scientists can better interpret measurements of ground motions following earthquakes, which give vital information on where stress is building up - and in turn where future earthquakes may occur.<br /><div style="width:100%;margin: 0px auto">
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</div><br />Earthquakes happen when pieces of Earth’s crust suddenly slip past each other along fault lines, releasing stored-up energy which propagates through the Earth and causes it to shake. This movement is generally a response to the build-up of tectonic forces in the Earth’s crust, causing the surface to buckle and eventually rupture in the form of an earthquake.<br /><br />Their work reveals that the way Earth’s surface settles after an earthquake, and stores stress prior to a repeat event, can ultimately be traced to tiny defects in rock crystals from the deep.<br /><br />“If you can understand how fast these deep rocks can flow, and how long it will take to transfer stress between different areas across a fault zone, then we might be able to get better predictions of when and where the next earthquake will strike,” said Wallis.<br /><br />The team subjected olivine crystals – the most common component of the upper mantle -- to a range of pressures and temperatures in order to replicate conditions of up to 100 km beneath Earth’s surface, where the rocks are so hot (roughly 1250oC) they move like syrup.<br /><br />Wallis likens their experiments to a blacksmith working with hot metal – at the highest temperatures, their samples were glowing white-hot and pliable.<br /><br />They observed the distorted crystal structures using a high-resolution form of electron microscopy, called electron backscatter diffraction, which Wallis has pioneered on geological materials.<br /><br />Their results shed light on how hot rocks in the upper mantle can mysteriously morph from flowing almost like syrup immediately after an earthquake to becoming thick and sluggish as time passes.<br /><br />This change in thickness -- or viscosity – transfers stress back to the cold and brittle rocks in the crust above, where it builds up – until the next earthquake strikes.<br /><br />The reason for this switch in behaviour has remained an open question, “We’ve known that microscale processes are a key factor controlling earthquakes for a while, but it’s been difficult to observe these tiny features in enough detail,” said Wallis. “Thanks to a state-of-the-art microscopy technique, we’ve been able to look into the crystal framework of hot, deep rocks and track down how important these miniscule defects really are”.<br /><br />Wallis and co-authors show that irregularities in the crystals become increasingly tangled over time; jostling for space due to their competing force fields – and it’s this process that causes the rocks to become more viscous.<br /><br />Until now it had been thought that this increase in viscosity was because of the competing push and pull of crystals against each other, rather than being caused by microscopic defects and their stress fields inside the crystals themselves.<br /><br />The team hope to apply their work to improving seismic hazard maps, which are often used in tectonically active areas like southern California to estimate where the next earthquake will occur. Current models, which are usually based on where earthquakes have struck in the past, and where stress must therefore be building up, only take into account the more immediate changes across a fault zone and do not consider gradual stress changes in rocks flowing deep within the Earth.<br /><br />Working with colleagues at Utrecht University, Wallis also plans to apply their new lab constraints to models of ground movements following the hazardous 2004 earthquake which struck Indonesia, and the 2011 Japan quake – both of which triggered tsunamis and lead to the loss of tens of thousands of lives.<br /><br /></p><p><u><i><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">The above story is based on <a href="https://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/rock-crystals-from-the-deep-give-microscopic-clues-to-earthquake-ground-movements" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">materials </a>provided by <a href="https://www.cam.ac.uk/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">University of Cambridge. </a></span></i></u><br /></p>

Rock Crystals From the Deep Give Microscopic Clues to Earthquake Ground Movements

Chunks of exotic green rocks from the mantle erupted from the San Carlos Volcanic Field, Arizona. Credit: James St John Microscopic imperf...

Watermelon Tourmaline: What Is Watermelon Tourmaline?

gemstones, Mineralogy, Minerals 7:15 PM

<p></p><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/-moIGXHHGp48/YPmW8eXpDEI/AAAAAAAATOY/jAn9rvsIIBwDfu4eU_1uNzxItrQfw7XoQCLcBGAsYHQ/s1035/What-is-Watermelon-Tourmaline-GeologyPage%2B%25281%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="863" data-original-width="1035" height="334" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-moIGXHHGp48/YPmW8eXpDEI/AAAAAAAATOY/jAn9rvsIIBwDfu4eU_1uNzxItrQfw7XoQCLcBGAsYHQ/w400-h334/What-is-Watermelon-Tourmaline-GeologyPage%2B%25281%2529.jpg" title="A slice of watermelon tourmaline" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A slice of watermelon tourmaline<br /></td></tr></tbody></table> <br /><p></p><p style="text-align: left;"> Watermelon tourmaline is a variety of concentrically color-zoned tourmaline with red interiors and green exteriors and is distinct from longitudinal bi-color or polychrome zonation.<br /> <br />All colored Tourmaline gems display pleochroism, meaning their color changes when viewed at different angles. In some Tourmaline gems, this effect is hardly noticeable, while in others it is strongly apparent. Gemstone cutters must take this into account when cutting a Tourmaline, so that the finished gem brings out its best color.<br /></p><h4 style="text-align: left;">What does watermelon tourmaline look like?</h4><p style="text-align: left;">As the name suggests, watermelon tourmaline displays banded colours that resemble a ripe slice of watermelon. The red or pink centre is surrounded by a rim of green, often separated by a sliver of pale pink or white. The brightly coloured zones can also occur at either end of the gem although there is some debate as to whether these stones should be classified as watermelon or simply bi-colour tourmalines.<br /><br /></p><div style="margin: 0px auto; width: 100%;">
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</div><br />Watermelon tourmaline crystals tend to form with a distinctive rounded triangular shape, as demonstrated beautifully in this stunning pendant by Paula Crevoshay. Watermelon tourmalines with vivid, clearly separated colours are very rare and command high prices. Matthew Morrell says: “Clean stones with good crystal in the 4-7 carats range, with an even distribution of each colour, change hands in Europe at between $500-$600 per carat.”<br /><br />Cutting the stone into slices like a loaf of bread rather than faceting the rough often enhances the resemblance to a real watermelon. Their complex structure makes tourmalines very difficult to cut. A great deal of expertise is required to identify areas of tension within the stone, which can cause it to crack during the cutting process. <p></p><h4 style="text-align: left;">What causes watermelon tourmaline’s colours?</h4><p style="text-align: left;">The bi-coloured and multi-coloured zoning that we so often see in tourmaline gems happens when the trace elements change in concentration or composition during a crystal’s growth. These unique gems can have coloured zones across the length of the crystal, or they can have a core of one colour and an outer edge of another colour. A single tourmaline crystal can contain up to 15 different colours or shades – no wonder it has been nicknamed the “Rainbow Gem”.<br /><br />In watermelon tourmaline, pink and green Elbaite crystals are found in the same stone, and these colour zones provide a visual record of its formation process.<br /><br />As the watermelon tourmaline crystal grows and thickens, it is exposed to different minerals such as manganese and lithium, which cause the gem to change colour from a pink centre through a pale zone to the green rind.</p><p style="text-align: left;"><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/-P7y6PCiVbX8/YPmZQNDC95I/AAAAAAAATOg/JuG25VkCIYAIBpFfe-p3Wxxkf-clm522ACLcBGAsYHQ/s800/Watermelon-Tourmaline%2B%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="800" height="400" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-P7y6PCiVbX8/YPmZQNDC95I/AAAAAAAATOg/JuG25VkCIYAIBpFfe-p3Wxxkf-clm522ACLcBGAsYHQ/w400-h400/Watermelon-Tourmaline%2B%25281%2529.jpg" title="A slice of watermelon tourmaline" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A slice of watermelon tourmaline</td></tr></tbody></table><br /></p><h4 style="text-align: left;">See also: </h4><p style="text-align: left;"><a href="https://www.geologyin.com/2018/04/tourmaline-species-and-color-varieties.html" target="_blank">Tourmaline: Species and Color Varieties</a><br /><a href="https://www.geologyin.com/2017/04/where-does-watermelon-tourmaline-come.html" target="_blank">Where Does Watermelon Tourmaline Come From?</a><br /><a href="https://www.geologyin.com/2017/02/why-fluorite-comes-in-different-colors.html" target="_blank">Why Fluorite Comes in Different Colors?</a><br /></p>

Watermelon Tourmaline: What Is Watermelon Tourmaline?

A slice of watermelon tourmaline Watermelon tourmaline is a variety of concentrically color-zoned tourmaline with red interiors and green...

Ancient 15,000-Year-Old Viruses Identified in Melting Tibetan Glaciers

News, Researches 6:48 PM

<p></p><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/-R3CTc6XzGdc/YPhgssNiynI/AAAAAAAATOQ/7uWfpMh4zSQxp-SAwCk3Ci0BpkoAJxeJgCLcBGAsYHQ/s1467/Multiple-Bacteriophages-Attached-to-Bacterial-Cell-Wall%2B%25281%2529%2B%25281%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="880" data-original-width="1467" height="384" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-R3CTc6XzGdc/YPhgssNiynI/AAAAAAAATOQ/7uWfpMh4zSQxp-SAwCk3Ci0BpkoAJxeJgCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h384/Multiple-Bacteriophages-Attached-to-Bacterial-Cell-Wall%2B%25281%2529%2B%25281%2529.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Bacteriophages on a bacterium. (Graham Beards/Wikimedia Commons/CC BY-SA 3.0)</td></tr></tbody></table> <br /><p></p><p>Scientists who study glacier ice have found viruses nearly 15,000 years old in two ice samples taken from the Tibetan Plateau in China. Most of those viruses, which survived because they had remained frozen, are unlike any viruses that have been cataloged to date.<br /><br />The findings, published today in the journal Microbiome, could help scientists understand how viruses have evolved over centuries. For this study, the scientists also created a new, ultra-clean method of analyzing microbes and viruses in ice without contaminating it.<br /><br />“These glaciers were formed gradually, and along with dust and gases, many, many viruses were also deposited in that ice,” said Zhi-Ping Zhong, lead author of the study and a researcher at The Ohio State University Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center who also focuses on microbiology. “The glaciers in western China are not well-studied, and our goal is to use this information to reflect past environments. And viruses are a part of those environments.”<br /></p><div style="margin: 0px auto; width: 100%;">
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</div><p><br />The researchers analyzed ice cores taken in 2015 from the Guliya ice cap in western China. The cores are collected at high altitudes – the summit of Guliya, where this ice originated, is 22,000 feet above sea level. The ice cores contain layers of ice that accumulate year after year, trapping whatever was in the atmosphere around them at the time each layer froze. Those layers create a timeline of sorts, which scientists have used to understand more about climate change, microbes, viruses and gases throughout history.<br /><br />Researchers determined that the ice was nearly 15,000 years old using a combination of traditional and new, novel techniques to date this ice core.<br /> </p><p>When they analyzed the ice, they found genetic codes for 33 viruses. Four of those viruses have already been identified by the scientific community. But at least 28 of them are novel. About half of them seemed to have survived at the time they were frozen not in spite of the ice, but because of it.<br /><br />“These are viruses that would have thrived in extreme environments,” said Matthew Sullivan, co-author of the study, professor of microbiology at Ohio State and director of Ohio State’s Center of Microbiome Science. “These viruses have signatures of genes that help them infect cells in cold environments – just surreal genetic signatures for how a virus is able to survive in extreme conditions. </p><p>These are not easy signatures to pull out, and the method that Zhi-Ping developed to decontaminate the cores and to study microbes and viruses in ice could help us search for these genetic sequences in other extreme icy environments – Mars, for example, the moon, or closer to home in Earth’s Atacama Desert.”<br /><br />Viruses do not share a common, universal gene, so naming a new virus – and attempting to figure out where it fits into the landscape of known viruses – involves multiple steps. To compare unidentified viruses with known viruses, scientists compare gene sets. Gene sets from known viruses are cataloged in scientific databases.<br /><br />Those database comparisons showed that four of the viruses in the Guliya ice cap cores had previously been identified and were from virus families that typically infect bacteria. The researchers found the viruses in concentrations much lower than have been found to exist in oceans or soil.<br /><br />The researchers’ analysis showed that the viruses likely originated with soil or plants, not with animals or humans, based on both the environment and the databases of known viruses.<br /><br />The study of viruses in glaciers is relatively new: Just two previous studies have identified viruses in ancient glacier ice. But it is an area of science that is becoming more important as the climate changes, said Lonnie Thompson, senior author of the study, distinguished university professor of earth sciences at Ohio State and senior research scientist at the Byrd Center.<br /><br />“We know very little about viruses and microbes in these extreme environments, and what is actually there,” Thompson said. “The documentation and understanding of that is extremely important: How do bacteria and viruses respond to climate change? What happens when we go from an ice age to a warm period like we’re in now?”<br /><br />This study was an interdisciplinary effort between Ohio State’s Byrd Center and its Center for Microbiome Science. The 2015 Guliya ice cores were collected and analyzed as part of a collaborative program between the Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center and the Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation and the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Funding also came from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation and the U.S. Department of Energy.<br /><br />A close look at the newly cleaned ice cores revealed the presence of 33 groups of virus genera, 28 of which are not known to modern science. The researchers noted that the viruses they found in the cores from the two sites differed from one another, likely because they represented different points in time and thus differences in climate. They note that their work might grow in importance as the planet heats up due to global warming and melts glaciers, possibly unleashing deadly viruses.<br /><br /> </p><p></p><p><u><i><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"> The above story is based on <a href="https://news.osu.edu/15000-year-old-viruses-discovered-in-tibetan-glacier-ice/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">materials </a>provided by <a href="https://www.osu.edu/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">The Ohio State University.</a></span></i></u></p>

Ancient 15,000-Year-Old Viruses Identified in Melting Tibetan Glaciers

Bacteriophages on a bacterium. (Graham Beards/Wikimedia Commons/CC BY-SA 3.0) Scientists who study glacier ice have found viruses nearly 1...

Rare Diamonds Show Life-Giving Elements Present on Earth Soon After It Formed

Diamonds, Earth History, Geochemistry 7:50 PM

<p><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/-rKHxiqKq0Us/YPG3-Msg4NI/AAAAAAAATNw/cTLYHVkgEwwmOQrK7Q69m8dd0fRcsj47ACLcBGAsYHQ/s1352/Rare%2Bdiamonds%2Bshow%2Blife-giving%2Belements%2Bpresent%2Bon%2BEarth%2Bsoon%2Bafter%2Bit%2Bformed%2B%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1014" data-original-width="1352" height="480" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rKHxiqKq0Us/YPG3-Msg4NI/AAAAAAAATNw/cTLYHVkgEwwmOQrK7Q69m8dd0fRcsj47ACLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h480/Rare%2Bdiamonds%2Bshow%2Blife-giving%2Belements%2Bpresent%2Bon%2BEarth%2Bsoon%2Bafter%2Bit%2Bformed%2B%25281%2529.jpg" title="One of the 2.7 billion year-old diamonds used in this work. Credit: Michael Broadley" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">One of the 2.7 billion year-old diamonds used in this work. Credit: Michael Broadley<br /></td></tr></tbody></table> <br /></p><p><span style="font-family: georgia;">Earth's atmosphere was primed for an 'explosion' in the diversity of life as early as 2.7 billion years ago, a study of ancient diamonds has revealed. </span><br /></p><p>A unique study of ancient diamonds has shown that the basic chemical composition of the Earth's atmosphere which makes it suitable for life's explosion of diversity was laid down at least 2.7 billion years ago. Volatile gases conserved in diamonds found in ancient rocks were present in similar proportions to those found in today's mantle, which in turn indicates that there has been no fundamental change in the proportions of volatiles in the atmosphere over the last few billion years. This shows that one of the basic conditions necessary to support life, the presence of life-giving elements in sufficient quantity, appeared soon after Earth formed, and has remained fairly constant ever since.<br /><br />Presenting the work at the Goldschmidt Geochemistry conference, lead researcher Dr Michael Broadly said, "The proportion and make-up of volatiles in the atmosphere reflects that found in the mantle, and we have no evidence of a significant change since these diamonds were formed 2.7 billion years ago".<br /><div style="width:100%;margin: 0px auto">
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</div><br />Volatiles, such as hydrogen, nitrogen, neon, and carbon-bearing species are light chemical elements and compounds, which can be readily vaporised due to heat, or pressure changes. They are necessary for life, especially carbon and nitrogen. Not all planets are rich in volatiles; Earth is volatile rich, as is Venus, but Mars and the Moon lost most of their volatiles into space. Generally, a planet rich in volatiles has a better chance of sustaining life, which is why much of the search for life on planets surrounding distant stars (exoplanets) has focused on looking for volatiles.<br /><br />On Earth, volatile substances mostly bubble up from the inside of the planet, and are brought to the surface through such things as volcanic eruptions. Knowing when the volatiles arrived in the Earth's atmosphere is key to understanding when the conditions on Earth were suitable for the origin and development of life, but until now there has been no way of understanding these conditions in the deep past.<br /><br />Now French and Canadian researchers have used ancient diamonds as a time capsule, to examine the conditions deep inside the Earth's mantle in the distant past. Studies of the gases trapped in these diamonds show that the volatile composition of the mantle has changed little over the last 2.7 billion years.<br /><br />Lead researcher, Michael Broadley (University of Lorraine, France) said "Studying the composition of the Earth's modern mantle is relatively simple. On average the mantle layer begins around 30km below the Earth's surface, and so we can collect samples thrown up by volcanoes and study the fluids and gases trapped inside. However, the constant churning of the Earth's crust via plate tectonics means that older samples have mostly been destroyed. Diamonds however, are comparatively indestructible, they're ideal time capsules".<br /><br />We managed to study diamonds trapped in 2.7 billion year old highly preserved rock from Wawa, on Lake Superior in Canada. This means that the diamonds are at least as old as the rocks they are found in - probably older. It's difficult to date diamonds, so this gave us a lucky opportunity to be sure of the minimum age. These diamonds are incredibly rare, and are not like the beautiful gems we think of when we think of diamonds. We heated them to over 2000 C to transform them into graphite, which then released tiny quantities of gas for measurement".<br /><br />The team measured the isotopes of Helium, Neon, and Argon, and found that they were present in similar proportions to those found in the upper mantle today. This means that there has probably been little change in the proportion of volatiles generally, and that the distribution of essential volatile elements between the mantle and the atmosphere are likely to have remained fairly stable throughout the majority of Earth's life. The mantle is the part between the Earth's crust and the core, it comprises around 84% of the Earth's volume.<br /><br />Dr Broadley continued "This was a surprising result. It means the volatile-rich environment we see around us today is not a recent development, so providing the right conditions for life to develop. Our work shows that these conditions were present at least 2.7 billion years ago, but the diamonds we use may be much older, so it's likely that these conditions were set well before our 2.7 billion year threshold".<br /><br /> </p><p><u><i>The above story is based on <a href="https://2021.goldschmidt.info/goldschmidt/2021/meetingapp.cgi" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">materials </a>provided by<a href="https://2021.goldschmidt.info/goldschmidt/2021/meetingapp.cgi" rel="nofollow" target="_blank"> Goldschmidt Conference.</a> </i></u><br /></p>

Rare Diamonds Show Life-Giving Elements Present on Earth Soon After It Formed

One of the 2.7 billion year-old diamonds used in this work. Credit: Michael Broadley Earth's atmosphere was primed for an 'explosi...

“Invisible” Gold – Fool’s Gold Actually Contains Real Gold

Geochemistry, Geology, Mining 7:13 PM

<p></p><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/-GTECD4V30EM/YO8L9TMGlPI/AAAAAAAATNM/F84MgWB9jFcIiSFkVNzLahIV6tAjCuh6QCLcBGAsYHQ/s1280/Fool%25E2%2580%2599s%2BGold%2BActually%2BContains%2BReal%2BGold%2B%25281%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="933" data-original-width="1280" height="291" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-GTECD4V30EM/YO8L9TMGlPI/AAAAAAAATNM/F84MgWB9jFcIiSFkVNzLahIV6tAjCuh6QCLcBGAsYHQ/w400-h291/Fool%25E2%2580%2599s%2BGold%2BActually%2BContains%2BReal%2BGold%2B%25281%2529.jpg" title="Pyrite with Quartz - Huanzala Mine, Huallanca District, Dos de Mayo Province, Huánuco Department Peru" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Pyrite with Quartz - Huanzala Mine, Huallanca District, Dos de Mayo Province, Peru<br />Photo: Fabre Minerals<br /></td></tr></tbody></table> <br /><p></p><p>Confirming once more that it cannot be trusted, the metal known as fool’s gold, aka pyrite, can contain bits of the real thing, according to an Australian-Chinese research team. Getting at the trapped gold, however, is likely to be more trouble than it’s worth.</p><p>Curtin University research has found tiny amounts of gold can be 
trapped inside pyrite, commonly known as "fool's gold," which would make
 it much more valuable than its name suggests.<br /><br />This study, 
published in the journal Geology in collaboration with the University of
 Western Australia and the China University of Geoscience, provides an 
in-depth analysis to better understand the mineralogical location of the
 trapped gold in pyrite, which may lead to more environmentally friendly
 gold extraction methods.<br /><br />Lead researcher Dr Denis Fougerouse 
from Curtin’s School of Earth and Planetary Sciences said this new type 
of “invisible” gold has not previously been recognised and is only 
observable using a scientific instrument called an atom probe.<br /></p><div style="margin: 0px auto; width: 100%;">
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</div><br />“The
 discovery rate of new gold deposits is in decline worldwide with the 
quality of ore degrading, parallel to the value of precious metal 
increasing,” Dr Fougerouse said.<br /><br />“Previously gold extractors have
 been able to find gold in pyrite either as nanoparticles or as a 
pyrite-gold alloy, but what we have discovered is that gold can also be 
hosted in nanoscale crystal defects, representing a new kind of 
“invisible” gold.<br /><br />“The more deformed the crystal is, the more 
gold there is locked up in defects. The gold is hosted in nanoscale 
defects called dislocations – one hundred thousand times smaller than 
the width of a human hair – so a special technique called atom probe 
tomography is needed to observe it.”<br /><br />Dr Fougerouse said the team 
also explored gold extraction methods and possible ways to obtain the 
trapped gold with less adverse impacts on the environment.<br /><br />“Generally,
 gold is extracted using pressure oxidizing techniques (similar to 
cooking), but this process is energy hungry. We wanted to look into an 
eco-friendlier way of extraction,” Dr Fougerouse said.<br /><br />“We looked
 into an extraction process called selective leaching, using a fluid to 
selectively dissolve the gold from the pyrite. Not only do the 
dislocations trap the gold, but they also behave as fluid pathways that 
enable the gold to be “leached” without affecting the entire pyrite.”<br /><p></p><p>In a Conversation article accompanying the paper’s release, Fougerouse wrote that it was previously suspected that bits of gold in pyrite crystals came about at different times, and the two minerals glommed together later on. </p><p>The pyrite specimen the team inspected suggested that the two minerals can crystallize simultaneously, in a single process. Fougerouse also noted that different methods could be used to release the gold particles from their pyrite prison, which could be more energy efficient than the typical means of gold extraction, reactor-based oxidation, or smaller-scale methods like separating the gold from slag by smelting the ore. <br /></p><p>The
 study is supported by the Australian Research Council and the Science 
and Industry Endowment Fund. Dr Fougerouse is affiliated with The 
Institute for Geoscience Research (TIGeR), Curtin’s flagship Earth 
Sciences research institute. </p><p><br /></p><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><i><u>The above story is based on <a href="https://research.curtin.edu.au/story/curtin-research-finds-fools-gold-not-so-foolish-after-all/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">materials </a>provided by <a href="https://www.curtin.edu.au/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Curtin University.</a></u></i></span><p> </p>

“Invisible” Gold – Fool’s Gold Actually Contains Real Gold

Pyrite with Quartz - Huanzala Mine, Huallanca District, Dos de Mayo Province, Peru Photo: Fabre Minerals Confirming once more that it cann...

World’s First Nuclear Bomb Test Created Rare, Otherworldly Crystal

Geochemistry, Geology, Researches 7:37 PM

World’s First Nuclear Bomb Test Created Rare, Otherworldly Crystal

This sample of red trinitite. Image credit: @TrinititeMan On Twitter. Newly Discovered Quasicrystal – “Magnificent in Its Complexity” – W...

'Icelandia': Is Iceland the Tip of a Vast, Sunken Continent?

earth, Geology 6:20 PM

<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-2kxuzPWRDy0/YOcTdibx21I/AAAAAAAATL0/c2aKdaJeb_AmLNsqQgDRanAvI24-E59bgCLcBGAsYHQ/s1280/%2527Icelandia%2527%2BIs%2BIceland%2Bthe%2BTip%2Bof%2Ba%2BVast%252C%2BSunken%2BContinent%2B%25281%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="1280" height="225" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-2kxuzPWRDy0/YOcTdibx21I/AAAAAAAATL0/c2aKdaJeb_AmLNsqQgDRanAvI24-E59bgCLcBGAsYHQ/w400-h225/%2527Icelandia%2527%2BIs%2BIceland%2Bthe%2BTip%2Bof%2Ba%2BVast%252C%2BSunken%2BContinent%2B%25281%2529.jpg" title="'Icelandia': Is Iceland the Tip of a Vast, Sunken Continent?" width="400" /></a></div> <br /><p></p><p>Academics believe they have identified a remarkable geological secret: A sunken continent hidden under Iceland and the surrounding ocean,which they have dubbed "Icelandia."<br /><br />An international team of geologists, led by Gillian Foulger, Emeritus Professor of Geophysics in the Department of Earth Sciences at Durham University (UK), believe the sunken continent could stretch from Greenland all the way to Europe.<br /><br />It is believed to cover an area of ~600,000 km2 but when adjoining areas west of Britain are included in a "Greater Icelandia," the entire area could be ~1,000,000 km2 in size.<br /><br />If proven, it means that the giant supercontinent of Pangaea, which is thought to have broken up over 50 million years ago, has in fact not fully broken up.<div style="width:100%;margin: 0px auto">
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</div>This new theory challenges long-held scientific ideas around the extent of oceanic and continental crust in the North Atlantic region, and how volcanic islands, like Iceland, formed.<br /><br />The presence of continental—rather than oceanic—crust could also spark discussions about a new source of minerals and hydrocarbons, both of which are contained in continental crust.<br /><br />The revolutionary new theory was born from an innovative series of expert meetings held in Durham and is included in a dedicated chapter of In the Footsteps of Warren B. Hamilton: New Ideas in Earth Science (published 29 June 2021 by the Geological Society of America), which Professor Foulger has co-written with Dr. Laurent Gernigon of the Geological Survey of Norway and Professor Laurent Geoffroy of the Ocean Geosciences Laboratory, University of Brest (France).<br /><br />Speaking about the new theory, Professor Foulger said, "Until now Iceland has puzzled geologists, as existing theories that it is built of and surrounded by oceanic crust are not supported by multiplegeological data. For example, the crust under Iceland is over 40 km thick—seven times thicker than normal oceanic crust. This simply could not be explained.<br /><br />"However, when we considered the possibility that this thick crust is continental, our data suddenly all made sense. This led us immediately to realize that the continental region was much bigger than Iceland itself—there is a hidden continent right there under the sea.<br /><br />"There is fantastic work to be done to prove the existence of Icelandia but it also opens up a completely new view of our geological understanding of the world. Something similar could be happening at many more places.<br /><br />"We could eventually see maps of our oceans and seas being redrawn as our understanding of what lies beneath changes."<br /><br />The research team is now working with collaborators from across the globe on work to test their theory, which will begin once COVID-19 restrictions allow.<br /><br />This work could involve electrical conductivity surveys, and the collection of zircon crystals in Iceland and elsewhere. Other tests such as seismic profiling and drilling would need millions of pounds to fund, but such is the importance of this work that funding may well be forthcoming.<br /><br />Professor Foulger is a world-leading geologist whose research has contributed to mapping the geological composition of the seabed in relation to continental land masses.<br /><br />This work has important legal and political ramifications, as under certain conditions, the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea grants coastal states exclusive rights to the non-living resources of their adjacent seabed if scientists can prove that the seabed is a submerged extension of the continental landmass.<br /><br />Professor Philip Steinberg, Director of IBRU, Durham University's Centrefor Borders Research, noted, "Countries around the world are spending enormous resources conducting subsea geologic research in order to identify their continental shelves and claim exclusive mineral rights there.<br /><br />"Research like Professor Foulger's, which forces us to rethink the relationship between seabed and continental geology, can have far-reaching impact for countries trying to determine what area of the seabed are their exclusive preserve and what areas are to be governed by the International Seabed Authority as the 'common heritage of humankind." </p><p><br /></p><p><u><i>The above story is based on <a href="https://pubs.geoscienceworld.org/books/book/2323/chapter/130412282/Icelandia" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">materials </a>provided by <a href="https://www.geosociety.org/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Geological Society of America.</a></i></u><br /></p>

'Icelandia': Is Iceland the Tip of a Vast, Sunken Continent?

Academics believe they have identified a remarkable geological secret: A sunken continent hidden under Iceland and the surrounding ocean,w...

Researchers Discover Why Gold Is Concentrated Alongside Arsenic

Geochemistry, Gold 8:20 PM

<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-EkJwQIKqF_o/YOM_EPTCucI/AAAAAAAATLo/fZZBxoNTF0EIysUFvtyvKLYajWafHPklQCLcBGAsYHQ/s1106/Researchers%2BDiscover%2BWhy%2BGold%2BIs%2BConcentrated%2BAlongside%2BArsenic%2B%25281%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="533" data-original-width="1106" height="308" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-EkJwQIKqF_o/YOM_EPTCucI/AAAAAAAATLo/fZZBxoNTF0EIysUFvtyvKLYajWafHPklQCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h308/Researchers%2BDiscover%2BWhy%2BGold%2BIs%2BConcentrated%2BAlongside%2BArsenic%2B%25281%2529.jpg" title="Researchers Discover Why Gold Is Concentrated Alongside Arsenic" width="640" /></a></div> <br /><p></p><p>Why are gold deposits found at all? Gold is famously unreactive, and there seems to be little reason why gold should be concentrated, rather than uniformly scattered throughout the Earth’s crust. Now an international group of geochemists have discovered why gold is concentrated alongside arsenic, explaining the formation of most gold deposits. This may also explain why many gold miners and others have been at risk from arsenic poisoning. This work is presented at the Goldschmidt conference, after recent publication.<br /><br />Gold is prized for its purity and stability. It's also rare enough to retain its value—the World Gold Council estimates that all the gold ever mined in the world would fit into a 20 x 20 x 20-meter cube. Additionally, because it is one of the most inert metals in the whole periodic table, it doesn't easily react with other substances. So why should gold come together in sufficient quantity to mine—in other words, why do gold deposits exist?<br /><br />Some gold is found as gold nuggets, but an appreciable amount is bound up with minerals. Gold is known to be related to iron- and arsenic-containing minerals, such as pyrite and arsenopyrite. These minerals act sort of like a sponge, and are capable of concentrating gold up to 1 million times more than is found elsewhere in nature, such as in the hot spring waters that transport gold. This gold becomes chemically bound in these minerals, so it is invisible to the naked eye.<div style="width:100%;margin: 0px auto">
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</div>The scientific team studied the action of the gold-concentrating minerals using the intense X-rays beam produced by the European Synchrotron (ESRF) at Grenoble in France, which can probe the chemical bonds between the mineral and gold.<br /><br />They found that when the mineral is enriched with arsenic, gold can enter mineral structural sites by directly binding to arsenic (forming, chemically speaking, Au(2+) and As(1-) bonds), which allows gold to be stabilised in the mineral. However, when the arsenic concentration is low, gold doesn't enter the mineral structure but only forms weak gold-sulfur bonds with the mineral surface.<br /><br />Lead researcher, Dr. Gleb Pokrovski, directeur de recherche at CNRS, GET-CNRS-University of Toulouse Paul Sabatier, said, "Our results show that arsenic drives the concentration of gold. This arsenic-driven gold pump explains how these iron sulfides can massively capture and then release gold, so controlling ore deposit formation and distribution. In practical terms, it means that it will make it easier to find new sources of gold and other precious metals, which bind to arsenic-containing iron sulfides. It may also open the door to controlling the chemical reactions, and if we can improve gold processing, we can recover more gold."<br /><br />The new model identifies just why gold tends to be found with arsenic. Dr. Pokrovski said, "It has been known for centuries that gold is found with arsenic, and this has caused severe health problems for gold miners. Now we know what happens at an atomic level, we can begin to see if there's anything we can do to prevent this."<br /><br />The noxious link between arsenic and gold is well-known in France and elsewhere in the world, including at the Salsigne mine near Carcassonne. This was one of Western Europe's largest gold mines, and the world's largest arsenic producer at one time. It closed in 2004, but the environmental consequences of the arsenic pollution still persist in the region.<br /><br />Dr. Jeffrey Hedenquist, University of Ottawa, said, "Geologists as well as prospectors have long known that gold can be associated with arsenic-rich minerals, and over the past few decades, others have quantified this association. The findings of Dr. Pokrovski and his team now help to explain why we see this association, caused by an atomic-scale attraction between gold and arsenic, with this marriage arranged by the structure of certain minerals."<br /><br /></p><p><br /><u><i>The above story is based on materials provided by <a href="https://goldschmidt.info/2016/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Goldschmidt Geochemistry Conference.</a></i></u></p>

Researchers Discover Why Gold Is Concentrated Alongside Arsenic

Why are gold deposits found at all? Gold is famously unreactive, and there seems to be little reason why gold should be concentrated, rath...

This Tiny, 120-Million-Year-Old Fossil Has a T. Rex-Like Skull on a Bird Body

evolution, extinction, Fossils 7:21 PM

This Tiny, 120-Million-Year-Old Fossil Has a T. Rex-Like Skull on a Bird Body

The new bird fossil. (Min Wang) A tiny, 120 million-year-old fossil, discovered in northeast China, is neither bird nor dinosaur but is pe...

Mineral Previously Known Only in Meteorites Discovered at Dead Sea

Geochemistry, Meteorite 7:04 PM

<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-kVjEt3Yngys/YNyTiLEgjSI/AAAAAAAATKk/aAznoca-zJwxji0BXEnVL4zCJO32FnOkACLcBGAsYHQ/s1200/Allabogdanite%2B%25281%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="738" data-original-width="1200" height="394" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-kVjEt3Yngys/YNyTiLEgjSI/AAAAAAAATKk/aAznoca-zJwxji0BXEnVL4zCJO32FnOkACLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h394/Allabogdanite%2B%25281%2529.jpg" title="Mineral Previously Known Only in Meteorites Discovered at Dead Sea" width="640" /></a></div> <br /><p></p><p>Allabogdanite was first reported in the early 2000s from the Onello—a small iron meteorite recovered from the gold placer at the Bolshoi Dolguchan River in Eastern Yakutia. Chemically, the mineral belongs to phosphides—the compounds containing phosphorus in a negative oxidation state. </p><p>It was named in honor of the crystallographer Alla Bogdanova. Since then, allabogdanite has been identified in several iron meteorites. The recent discovery at the Dead Sea is the first confirmation of the mineral on Earth. Allabogdanite was detected in the course of a systematic study of terrestrial phosphides from the Dead Sea region.<br /><br />"Our research included the experiments on phase transitions of terrestrial allabogdanite at high pressure and high temperature at the DESY synchrotron light source in Germany," said Sergey Britvin, the main author of the article, professor in the Department of Crystallography at St Petersburg University. </p><p><div style="width:100%;margin: 0px auto">
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</div><br /></p><p>"It has been found that terrestrial allabogdanite could be formed at pressures exceeding 25 gigapascals that corresponds to ca. 250 kbar. Such high pressures on Earth can be attained during catastrophic collisions with large meteorite impactors, or at the Earth's mantle conditions, at a depth of more than 500 kilometers. </p><p>However, the discovery of terrestrial allabogdanite is associated with the surface rocks of the Hatrurim Formation (also known as the Mottled Zone) in the Negev Desert in Israel. This is the area where natural cyclophosphates have been recently discovered."<br /><br />Professor Sergey Britvin added that the discovery of allabogdanite in the historical region of the South Levant in the Middle East raises many questions related to the formation conditions of surficial rocks in this region.<br /><br />Despite the fact that allabogdanite was discovered in meteorite almost 20 years ago, it was only in 2008 that it was shown that the mineral belongs to the indicators of high pressure. The results of current research evidence that terrestrial allabogdanite is a metastable high pressure phase. It was formed as a result of transformation from another mineral—barringerite, and was preserved under normal conditions as a result of quenching—an abrupt release of temperature and pressure.<br /><br />"This way excludes the possibility of allabogdanite formation as an intermediate phase from the elements under atmospheric pressure. This, in turn, raises a number of key questions regarding the origin of rocks in the Mottled Zone. </p><p>Until now, no evidence for the large meteorite collisions or the rocks having Earth's mantle origin has been found in the South Levant. However, such evidence might have been 'erased' from the Earth's surface as a result of later processes of geological erosion. The discovery of allabogdanite justifies the necessity of further research in this direction," said Professor Sergey Britvin.</p><p> </p><p><i><u> The above story is based on <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.2138/am-2021-7621" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">materials </a>provided by <a href="https://english.spbu.ru/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">St. Petersburg State University.</a></u></i><br /></p>

Mineral Previously Known Only in Meteorites Discovered at Dead Sea

Allabogdanite was first reported in the early 2000s from the Onello—a small iron meteorite recovered from the gold placer at the Bolshoi D...

“Invisible” Gold – Fool’s Gold Actually Contains Real Gold

Geochemistry, Mineralogy 7:47 PM

“Invisible” Gold – Fool’s Gold Actually Contains Real Gold

Pyrite, Casapalca Mine, Huarochiri Province, Lima, Peru Photo: Mineralauctions Curtin University research has found tiny amounts of gold c...

Ancient Fungal Parasite of Ants Found Preserved in Baltic Amber

amber, Fossils 7:06 PM

<p></p><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/-o4ixmuyc3TY/YNX-NZlCvFI/AAAAAAAATKA/2-ecP_grCQwlQJZQkTqSXISPtew6m_4igCLcBGAsYHQ/s1349/Ant%2Btrapped%2Bin%2Bancient%2Bamber%2Bwith%2Bparasitic%2Bmushroom%2Bstuck%2Bin%2Bits%2Bbutt%2B%25281%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="915" data-original-width="1349" height="434" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-o4ixmuyc3TY/YNX-NZlCvFI/AAAAAAAATKA/2-ecP_grCQwlQJZQkTqSXISPtew6m_4igCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h434/Ant%2Btrapped%2Bin%2Bancient%2Bamber%2Bwith%2Bparasitic%2Bmushroom%2Bstuck%2Bin%2Bits%2Bbutt%2B%25281%2529.jpg" title="Ant trapped in ancient amber with parasitic mushroom stuck in its butt" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">About 50 million years ago, this ant got stuck in tree resin that also preserved the parasitic fungus that was giving it a hard time.<br />George Poinar Jr./OSU</td></tr></tbody></table> <br /><p></p><p>Oregon State University research has identified the oldest known specimen of a fungus parasitizing an ant, and the fossil also represents a new fungal genus and species.<br /><br />“It’s a mushroom growing out of a carpenter ant,” said OSU’s George Poinar Jr., an international expert in using plant and animal life forms preserved in amber to learn about the biology and ecology of the distant past.<br /><br />A mushroom is the reproductive structure of many fungi, including the ones you find growing in your yard, and Poinar and a collaborator in France named their discovery Allocordyceps baltica. They found the new type of Ascomycota fungi in an ant preserved in 50-million-year-old amber from Europe’s Baltic region.</p><div style="margin: 0px auto; width: 100%;">
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</div>“Ants are hosts to a number of intriguing parasites, some of which modify the insects’ behavior to benefit the parasites’ development and dispersion,” said Poinar, who has a courtesy appointment in the OSU College of Science. “Ants of the tribe Camponotini, commonly known as carpenter ants, seem especially susceptible to fungal pathogens of the genus Ophiocordyceps, including one species that compels infected ants to bite into various erect plant parts just before they die.”<br /><br />Doing so, he explains, puts the ants in a favorable position for allowing fungal spores to be released from cup-shaped ascomata – the fungi’s fruiting body –protruding from the ants’ head and neck. Carpenter ants usually make their nests in trees, rotting logs and stumps.<br /><br />The new fungal genus and species shares certain features with Ophiocordyceps but also displays several developmental stages not previously reported, Poinar said. To name the genus, placed in the order Hypocreales, Poinar and fellow researcher Yves-Marie Maltier combined the Greek word for new – alloios – with the name of known genus Cordyceps.<br /><br />“We can see a large, orange, cup-shaped ascoma with developing perithecia – flask-shaped structures that let the spores out – emerging from the rectum of the ant,” Poinar said. “The vegetative part of the fungus is coming out of the abdomen and the base of the neck. We see freestanding fungal bodies also bearing what look like perithecia, and in addition we see what look like the sacs where spores develop. All of the stages, those attached to the ant and the freestanding ones, are of the same species.”<br /><br />The fungus could not be placed in the known ant-infecting genus Ophiocordyceps because ascomata in those species usually come out the neck or head of an ant, Poinar said, and not the rectum.<br /><br />“There is no doubt that Allocordyceps represents a fungal infection of a Camponotus ant,” he said. “This is the first fossil record of a member of the Hypocreales order emerging from the body of an ant. And as the earliest fossil record of fungal parasitism of ants, it can be used in future studies as a reference point regarding the origin of the fungus-ant association.” <p></p><p><br /><i><u><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">The above story is based on <span style="color: black;"><a href="https://today.oregonstate.edu/news/mushroom-growing-out-fossilized-ant-reveals-new-genus-and-species-fungal-parasite" rel="nofollow" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; border-radius: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; 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; 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;"><span> </span>provided by<span> </span></span><a href="http://oregonstate.edu/" rel="nofollow" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; border-radius: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; 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"><b style="border-radius: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-weight: bold;">Oregon State University</b></a><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; 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;">. Original written by Steve Lundeberg.</span></span></span></u></i></p>

Ancient Fungal Parasite of Ants Found Preserved in Baltic Amber

About 50 million years ago, this ant got stuck in tree resin that also preserved the parasitic fungus that was giving it a hard time. George...

Siberian Volcanic Eruptions Triggered End-Permian Mass Extinction

Earth History, extinction 6:47 PM

<p><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/-cuJHPlR9_Ws/YNIF7i5H_CI/AAAAAAAATJ0/YmwudJpK7CIzdxWpirUdwBr4NWup40uTACLcBGAsYHQ/s1232/Siberian%2BVolcanic%2BEruptions%2BTriggered%2BEnd-Permian%2BMass%2BExtinction.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="693" data-original-width="1232" height="360" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cuJHPlR9_Ws/YNIF7i5H_CI/AAAAAAAATJ0/YmwudJpK7CIzdxWpirUdwBr4NWup40uTACLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h360/Siberian%2BVolcanic%2BEruptions%2BTriggered%2BEnd-Permian%2BMass%2BExtinction.jpg" title="Fossilized crinoids, marine invertebrates that lived during the Permian Period, found in western Australia. Credit...John Cancalosi, via Getty Images" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Fossilized crinoids, marine invertebrates that lived during the Permian Period, found in western Australia. Credit...John Cancalosi, via Getty Images</td></tr></tbody></table> <br /></p><p>The most severe mass extinction event in the past 540 million years eliminated more than 90 percent of Earth's marine species and 75 percent of terrestrial species. Although scientists had previously hypothesized that the end-Permian mass extinction, which took place 251 million years ago, was triggered by voluminous volcanic eruptions in a region of what is now Siberia, they were not able to explain the mechanism by which the eruptions resulted in the extinction of so many different species, both in the oceans and on land.<br /><br />Associate professor Laura Wasylenki of Northern Arizona University's School of Earth and Sustainability and Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry is co-author on a new paper in Nature Communications entitled, "Nickel isotopes link Siberian Traps aerosol particles to the end-Permian mass extinction," in collaboration with Chinese, Canadian and Swiss scientists. <br /><br />The paper presents the results of nickel isotope analyses performed in Wasylenki's lab on Late Permian sedimentary rocks collected in Arctic Canada. The samples have the lightest nickel isotope ratios ever measured in sedimentary rocks, and the only plausible explanation is that the nickel was sourced from the volcanic terrain, very likely carried by aerosol particles and deposited in the ocean, where it dramatically changed the chemistry of seawater and severely disrupted the marine ecosystem.<br /><br />"The study results provide strong evidence that nickel-rich particles were aerosolized and dispersed widely, both through the atmosphere and into the ocean," Wasylenki said. "Nickel is an essential trace metal for many organisms, but an increase in nickel abundance would have driven an unusual surge in productivity of methanogens, microorganisms that produce methane gas. Increased methane would have been tremendously harmful to all oxygen-dependent life."<br /><br />"Our data provide a direct link between global dispersion of Ni-rich aerosols, ocean chemistry changes and the mass extinction event," Wasylenki said. "The data also demonstrate that environmental degradation likely began well before the extinction event -- perhaps starting as early as 300,000 years before then. Prior to this study, the connection between Siberian Traps flood basalt volcanism, marine anoxia and mass extinction was rather vague, but now we have evidence of a specific kill mechanism. This finding demonstrates the power of nickel isotope analyses, which are relatively new, to solve long-standing problems in the geosciences."<br /><br />Wasylenki, who joined NAU in 2018, was formerly an igneous petrologist and then a specialist in calcite crystal growth and biomineralization. She now focuses on the use of metal stable isotope geochemistry to address geological, environmental and biological questions. Many of her recent and current projects have investigated metal isotope effects at solid-fluid interfaces, in particular during metal adsorption to oxyhydroxide mineral particles. <br /><br />This work has implications for ancient and modern geochemical cycles and environmental metal transport. Wasylenki's lab group, named Systematic Experimental Study and Analysis of Metals in the Environment (SESAME Lab), focuses on two main research themes, the cycling of transition metals in modern and ancient oceans and the environmental transport of toxic heavy metals.</p><p> </p><p><u><i><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"> The above story is based on <span style="color: black;"><a href="https://nau.edu/nau-research/mass-extinction/" rel="nofollow" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; border-radius: 0px !important; box-sizing: border-box; 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; 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;"><span> </span>provided by<span> </span></span><a href="http://www.nau.edu/" rel="nofollow" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; border-radius: 0px !important; box-sizing: border-box; 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"><strong style="border-radius: 0px !important; box-sizing: border-box; font-weight: bold;">Northern Arizona University</strong></a><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; 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;">.</span></span></span></i></u></p>

Siberian Volcanic Eruptions Triggered End-Permian Mass Extinction

Fossilized crinoids, marine invertebrates that lived during the Permian Period, found in western Australia. Credit...John Cancalosi, via Get...

Earth Has a 27.5-Million-Year 'Heartbeat', But We Don't Know What Causes It

Earth History, Geology 6:00 PM

<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZH7OCtS0W4g/YNCo5uV9p2I/AAAAAAAATJs/QZsiI86DbJ05CbBcySbGb72_1Xgdy6gEQCLcBGAsYHQ/s1290/the-geological-time-scale%2B%25281%2529.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="998" data-original-width="1290" height="496" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZH7OCtS0W4g/YNCo5uV9p2I/AAAAAAAATJs/QZsiI86DbJ05CbBcySbGb72_1Xgdy6gEQCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h496/the-geological-time-scale%2B%25281%2529.jpeg" width="640" /></a></div> <br /><p></p><p>In the last 260 million years, dinosaurs came and went, Pangea split into the continents and islands we see today, and humans have quickly and irreversibly changed the world we live in.<br /></p><p>Geologic activity on Earth appears to follow a 27.5-million-year cycle, giving the planet a "pulse," according to a new study published in the journal Geoscience Frontiers.<br /><br />"Many geologists believe that geological events are random over time. But our study provides statistical evidence for a common cycle, suggesting that these geologic events are correlated and not random," said Michael Rampino, a geologist and professor in New York University's Department of Biology, as well as the study's lead author.<br /><br />Over the past five decades, researchers have proposed cycles of major geological events--including volcanic activity and mass extinctions on land and sea--ranging from roughly 26 to 36 million years. But early work on these correlations in the geological record was hampered by limitations in the age-dating of geologic events, which prevented scientists from conducting quantitative investigations.<br /><br />However, there have been significant improvements in radio-isotopic dating techniques and changes in the geologic timescale, leading to new data on the timing of past events. Using the latest age-dating data available, Rampino and his colleagues compiled updated records of major geological events over the last 260 million years and conducted new analyses.<br /><br />The team analyzed the ages of 89 well-dated major geological events of the last 260 million years. These events include marine and land extinctions, major volcanic outpourings of lava called flood-basalt eruptions, events when oceans were depleted of oxygen, sea-level fluctuations, and changes or reorganization in the Earth's tectonic plates.<br /><br />They found that these global geologic events are generally clustered at 10 different timepoints over the 260 million years, grouped in peaks or pulses of roughly 27.5 million years apart. The most recent cluster of geological events was approximately 7 million years ago, suggesting that the next pulse of major geological activity is more than 20 million years in the future.<br /><br />The researchers posit that these pulses may be a function of cycles of activity in the Earth's interior--geophysical processes related to the dynamics of plate tectonics and climate. However, similar cycles in the Earth's orbit in space might also be pacing these events.<br /><br />"Whatever the origins of these cyclical episodes, our findings support the case for a largely periodic, coordinated, and intermittently catastrophic geologic record, which is a departure from the views held by many geologists," explained Rampino.</p><p> </p><p><u><i>The above story is based on <a href="https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2021-06/nyu-teh061821.php" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">materials </a>provided by <a href="https://www.nyu.edu/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">New York University. </a></i></u><br /></p>

Earth Has a 27.5-Million-Year 'Heartbeat', But We Don't Know What Causes It

In the last 260 million years, dinosaurs came and went, Pangea split into the continents and islands we see today, and humans have quickly...

The Dynamic, Geological Process Happening in Your Kidney

Geology, Researches 5:23 PM

<p><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/-EmC0GhOEQoY/YMyrPyQFe-I/AAAAAAAATFg/1q9mxg2loc0V-mdKDU-OvFjNqaJsrfibwCLcBGAsYHQ/s1200/The%2BDynamic%252C%2BGeological%2BProcess%2BHappening%2Bin%2BYour%2BKidney%2B%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1200" height="480" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-EmC0GhOEQoY/YMyrPyQFe-I/AAAAAAAATFg/1q9mxg2loc0V-mdKDU-OvFjNqaJsrfibwCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h480/The%2BDynamic%252C%2BGeological%2BProcess%2BHappening%2Bin%2BYour%2BKidney%2B%25281%2529.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">kidney stones</td></tr></tbody></table> <br /></p><p style="text-align: left;">Over a period of three months to three years, compounds like calcium, uric acid and bits of organic matter coalesce into the crystallized structure we know as the kidney stone.<br /><br />This formation process, as it turns out, is remarkably similar to geological processes in some coral reefs, hot springs and even ancient Roman aqueducts. After formation, they appear to dissolve, fracture and crystallize. When researchers probe the mineral layers in kidney stones, they find it looks much like a nanoscale version of the multi-colored strata of the Grand Canyon. <br /><br />For the past several years, a team of experts in geology, urology and nephrology have analyzed 90,000 kidney stones from all over the world. In a study published last month in the journal Nature Reviews Urology, the team reports on this formation process and proposes a new, geology-based way to classify kidney stones.<br /><br />What they found upends the previously accepted notion that once kidney stones form, they likely can’t dissolve under conditions found in the kidney. Instead, it appears that at least half of the stone’s volume goes through a process in which it dissolves and recrystallizes. This finding may shift how scientists approach kidney stones for years to come, from the way they’re treated to how they’re classified, and even how we understand the kidney’s microbial community.<br /><br />“This idea of life, water, mineral interaction is really fundamental to everything,” says Bruce Fouke, geobiologist and director of the Roy J. Carver Biotechnology Center at the University of Illinois. “The human body is a life-water-mineral interaction machine.”<br /></p><h4 style="text-align: left;">Reading 'Nature’s Record Book'</h4><p style="text-align: left;">Kidney stones are one of the oldest and most prevalent ailments. The oldest known kidney stone was found in an Egyptian burial cloth dating back to 4400 B.C. Cuneiform tablets from Ancient Babylonia suggest stone formation may be related to beer and water consumption. Today, 12 percent of the world’s population, or nearly one billion people, is estimated to have a kidney stone at any given time.<br /><div style="width:100%;margin: 0px auto">
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</div><br />These typically form when there is an abundance of calcium, oxalate or uric acid in the kidney. These materials can crystallize without dilution from fluid in the kidney. The process of passing a kidney stone can be as painful as giving birth, according to some women who have experienced both.<br /><br />After kidney stones are removed from a person, either through natural passing or surgery, Fouke says that clinicians typically disregard them as no more than a crystallized lump. This paper turns that assumption on its head.<br /><br />“Probably the most high fidelity, high resolution and sensitive indicator of long term history of the kidney is actually a kidney stone,” says Fouke, who leads the team.<br /><br />To read this natural record, researchers can probe the mineralized layers using highly efficient slicing and imaging tools. Using a suite of established and novel tools, scientists can slice stones into sections as thin as rice paper. They then illuminate it with an ultraviolet light at a resolution of 10 nanometers, which makes the organic material in that section glow. They can create images showing the composition of each layer, allowing them to understand how compounds accumulate and dissolve in the kidney down to the minute.<br /><br />In hot springs and coral reefs, microbes spur quick mineralization. The human body, on the other hand, has evolved what Fouke calls an “arsenal” of bio compounds to protect the body by slowing kidney stone growth. However, kidney stones seem to form far more layers than what has been observed in comparable natural settings.<br /><br />Fouke says this process, called universal biomineralization, has been widely studied in geology but rarely applied to medicine. By approaching kidney stones from a geological lens, researchers created a new schema for classifying stones based on where they form in the kidney.<br /><br />Kidney stones are often characterized based on where they form within the kidney. The accepted schema has traditionally been that they can form in one of two places in the kidney — in what are known as Randall’s plaque and Randall’s plug. But when the team probed the chemical compositions of the stones, they realized the components of the stones could be derived from various places in the kidney.<br /><br />“In my work in coral reefs and hot springs and meteor impacts and all these other natural amazing environments on Earth, I saw great similarities, and they had nothing to do with Randall’s plaque or Randall’s plug,” Fouke says.<br /><br />The team proposed a new, more nuanced classification scheme, which characterizes stones based on the chemical, physical and biological processes underpinning their formation. <br /></p><h4 style="text-align: left;">What This Means for Future Research</h4><p style="text-align: left;">Fouke says sometime in the near future, people may be able to better understand their kidney function after passing a kidney stone or having it removed. Within 15 minutes, clinicians may use a small benchtop lab to cut it and polish the stone, shine ultraviolet light on it and get a high sensitivity record of what the kidney is doing.<br /><br />As researchers understand more about how and why stones form, they may be able to introduce certain treatments like drugs that can interrupt the crystallization process or encourage dissolution.<br /><br />“We're too early to say exactly what treatment we have but I think once you start understanding what's going on, then one can imagine you might develop ways to interrupt that in a positive way,” says John Lieske, a nephrologist and director of Mayo Clinic’s Rare Kidney Stone Consortium and co-leader of the work.<br /><br />Lieske says this could be a “game shift” in terms of how urologists and nephrologists think about the chemistry of kidney stones.<br /><br />In upcoming studies, the team plans to build artificial environments where they can reproduce kidney stones to understand the role of different compounds.<br /><br />Kidney stones are a prime example of mineral accumulation in the human body. But research on biomineralization could be key for tackling issues like climate change, environmental sustainability, human medicine and even space exploration.<br /><br />“Biomineralization is so fundamental that life couldn't have started without it,” Fouke says. “And now we're seeing that there are a thousand applications within the human body and we’re just scratching the tip of the iceberg.” </p><p style="text-align: left;"><br /><i><u>The above story is based on <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41585-021-00469-x" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">materials </a>provided by GeoBioMed.</u></i><br /></p>

The Dynamic, Geological Process Happening in Your Kidney

kidney stones Over a period of three months to three years, compounds like calcium, uric acid and bits of organic matter coalesce into the...

World’s Third Largest Diamond Discovered in Botswana

Diamonds, gemstones 3:48 PM

World’s Third Largest Diamond Discovered in Botswana

Botswana’s president, Mokgweetsi Masisi, inspects Debswana’s find. Photograph: Monirul Bhuiyan/AFP/Getty Images A 1,098-carat diamond, bel...

More Than 600 Earthquakes Hit Area Along San Andreas Fault Since Saturday

Earthquakes, News 7:44 PM

<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-4k5st3S7mYI/YMeGy9ltpmI/AAAAAAAATEs/bo1CjsOCdaMVEYygumPVITYH0LAbo-VrgCLcBGAsYHQ/s1170/Over%2B600%2Bearthquakes%2Bin%2BSouthern%2BCalifornia%2B%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="675" data-original-width="1170" height="370" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-4k5st3S7mYI/YMeGy9ltpmI/AAAAAAAATEs/bo1CjsOCdaMVEYygumPVITYH0LAbo-VrgCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h370/Over%2B600%2Bearthquakes%2Bin%2BSouthern%2BCalifornia%2B%25281%2529.jpg" width="640" /></a></div> <br /><p></p><p>A rural area of Southern California near the Mexico border and along the San Andreas fault line saw more than 600 earthquakes in a 24-hour period.<br /><br />California and Oregon dealt with several earthquakes since Friday, with the highest registering at 5.3 on the Richter scale.<br /><br /><a href="https://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/map/?extent=14.09396,-144.22852&extent=56.65623,-45.79102" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">According to the USGS map</a>, the majority of the earthquakes occurred near the city Calipatria, which lies alongside the San Andreas Fault and is about 30 miles north of the Mexican border.<br /><br />The strength of the quakes varied, with the strongest coming in at 5.3.<br /><br />The USGS map showed four of the earthquakes measuring above a 4 on the Richter scale, and at least 29 registering above a 3.<br /><br />California was not the only state on the West Coast to be affected, as two earthquakes near a magnitude of 6 occurred very close to Oregon on Friday, and even more on Sunday morning, ranging from 3.9 to 5.9.<br /></p><p>The San Andreas Fault is a continental transform fault that extends roughly 1,200 kilometers through California. It forms the tectonic boundary between the Pacific Plate and the North American Plate, and its motion is right-lateral strike-slip.<br /><br /> </p>

More Than 600 Earthquakes Hit Area Along San Andreas Fault Since Saturday

A rural area of Southern California near the Mexico border and along the San Andreas fault line saw more than 600 earthquakes in a 24-hour...

Earth's Core Is Growing "Lopsided' and Scientists Don't Know Why

earth, Geology, Researches 7:21 PM

<p><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/-OWu8bUySLNE/YMeBxgwjZ8I/AAAAAAAATEk/SAncx2IG_EgWS3vBMDih6GnJlZMz9f1dwCLcBGAsYHQ/s1015/EDF1_PKPica_figure1_src_sta_V2-750px%2B%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="769" data-original-width="1015" height="484" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-OWu8bUySLNE/YMeBxgwjZ8I/AAAAAAAATEk/SAncx2IG_EgWS3vBMDih6GnJlZMz9f1dwCLcBGAsYHQ/w640-h484/EDF1_PKPica_figure1_src_sta_V2-750px%2B%25281%2529.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Map showing the seismometers (triangles) at which the researchers measured seismic waves from earthquakes (circles) to study Earth’s inner core. The stations colored cyan are where new measurements were made for the study, mostly sampling the inner core between the north and south poles. (UC Berkeley graphic by Daniel Frost)<br /></td></tr></tbody></table> <br /></p><p style="text-align: left;">For reasons unknown, Earth’s solid-iron inner core is growing faster on one side than the other, and it has been ever since it started to freeze out from molten iron more than half a billion years ago, according to a new study by seismologists at the University of California, Berkeley.<br /><br />The faster growth under Indonesia’s Banda Sea hasn’t left the core lopsided. Gravity evenly distributes the new growth — iron crystals that form as the molten iron cools — to maintain a spherical inner core that grows in radius by an average of 1 millimeter per year.<br /><br />But the enhanced growth on one side suggests that something in Earth’s outer core or mantle under Indonesia is removing heat from the inner core at a faster rate than on the opposite side, under Brazil. Quicker cooling on one side would accelerate iron crystallization and inner core growth on that side.<br /><br />This has implications for Earth’s magnetic field and its history, because convection in the outer core driven by release of heat from the inner core is what today drives the dynamo that generates the magnetic field that protects us from dangerous particles from the sun.<br /><br />“We provide rather loose bounds on the age of the inner core — between half a billion and 1.5 billion years — that can be of help in the debate about how the magnetic field was generated prior to the existence of the solid inner core,” said Barbara Romanowicz, UC Berkeley Professor of the Graduate School in the Department of Earth and Planetary Science and emeritus director of the Berkeley Seismological Laboratory (BSL). “We know the magnetic field already existed 3 billion years ago, so other processes must have driven convection in the outer core at that time.”<br /></p><div style="margin: 0px auto; width: 100%;">
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</div><br />The youngish age of the inner core may mean that, early in Earth’s history, the heat boiling the fluid core came from light elements separating from iron, not from crystallization of iron, which we see today.<br /><br />“Debate about the age of the inner core has been going on for a long time,” said Daniel Frost, assistant project scientist at the BSL. “The complication is: If the inner core has been able to exist only for 1.5 billion years, based on what we know about how it loses heat and how hot it is, then where did the older magnetic field come from? That is where this idea of dissolved light elements that then freeze out came from.”<br /><p></p><h4 style="text-align: left;">Freezing iron</h4><p style="text-align: left;">Asymmetric growth of the inner core explains a three-decade-old mystery — that the crystallized iron in the core seems to be preferentially aligned along the rotation axis of the earth, more so in the west than in the east, whereas one would expect the crystals to be randomly oriented.<br /><br />Evidence for this alignment comes from measurements of the travel time of seismic waves from earthquakes through the inner core. Seismic waves travel faster in the direction of the north-south rotation axis than along the equator, an asymmetry that geologists attribute to iron crystals — which are asymmetric — having their long axes preferentially aligned along Earth’s axis.<br /><br />If the core is solid crystalline iron, how do the iron crystals get oriented preferentially in one direction?<br /><br />In an attempt to explain the observations, Frost and colleagues Marine Lasbleis of the Université de Nantes in France and Brian Chandler and Romanowicz of UC Berkeley created a computer model of crystal growth in the inner core that incorporates geodynamic growth models and the mineral physics of iron at high pressure and high temperature.<br /><br />“The simplest model seemed a bit unusual — that the inner core is asymmetric,” Frost said. “The west side looks different from the east side all the way to the center, not just at the top of the inner core, as some have suggested. The only way we can explain that is by one side growing faster than the other.”<br /><br />The model describes how asymmetric growth — about 60% higher in the east than the west — can preferentially orient iron crystals along the rotation axis, with more alignment in the west than in the east, and explain the difference in seismic wave velocity across the inner core.<br /><br />“What we’re proposing in this paper is a model of lopsided solid convection in the inner core that reconciles seismic observations and plausible geodynamic boundary conditions,” Romanowicz said.<br /><br />Frost, Romanowicz and their colleagues will report their findings in this week’s issue of the journal Nature Geoscience.<br /></p><h4 style="text-align: left;">Probing Earth’s interior with seismic waves</h4><p style="text-align: left;">Earth’s interior is layered like an onion. The solid iron-nickel inner core — today 1,200 kilometers (745 miles) in radius, or about three-quarters the size of the moon — is surrounded by a fluid outer core of molten iron and nickel about 2,400 kilometers (1,500 miles) thick. The outer core is surrounded by a mantle of hot rock 2,900 kilometers (1,800 miles) thick and overlain by a thin, cool, rocky crust at the surface.<br /><br />Convection occurs both in the outer core, which slowly boils as heat from crystallizing iron comes out of the inner core, and in the mantle, as hotter rock moves upward to carry this heat from the center of the planet to the surface. The vigorous boiling motion in the liquid-iron outer core produces Earth’s magnetic field.<br /><br />According to Frost’s computer model, which he created with the help of Lasbleis, as iron crystals grow, gravity redistributes the excess growth in the east toward the west within the inner core. That movement of crystals within the rather soft solid of the inner core — which is close to the melting point of iron at these high pressures — aligns the crystal lattice along the rotation axis of Earth to a greater degree in the west than in the east.<br /><br />The model correctly predicts the researchers’ new observations about seismic wave travel times through the inner core: The anisotropy, or difference in travel times parallel and perpendicular to the rotation axis, increases with depth, and the strongest anisotropy is offset to the west from Earth’s rotation axis by about 400 kilometers (250 miles).<br /><br />The model of inner core growth also provides limits on the proportion of nickel to iron in the center of the earth, Frost said. His model does not accurately reproduce seismic observations unless nickel makes up between 4% and 8% of the inner core — which is close to the proportion in metallic meteorites that once presumably were the cores of dwarf planets in our solar system. The model also tells geologists how viscous, or fluid, the inner core is.<br /><br />“We suggest that the viscosity of the inner core is relatively large, an input parameter of importance to geodynamicists studying the dynamo processes in the outer core,” Romanowicz said. </p><p style="text-align: left;"> </p><p style="text-align: left;"><u><i>The above story is based on <a href="https://news.berkeley.edu/2021/06/03/is-earths-core-lopsided-strange-goings-on-in-our-planets-interior/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">materials </a>provided by <a href="https://www.berkeley.edu/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">University of California, Berkeley.</a></i></u><br /></p>

Earth's Core Is Growing "Lopsided' and Scientists Don't Know Why

Map showing the seismometers (triangles) at which the researchers measured seismic waves from earthquakes (circles) to study Earth’s inner c...

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