Saed News: Scientists have recently discovered a new structure within the Earth's core, and now there’s news of the discovery of a massive ocean beneath the Earth's crust. Science fiction stories are getting closer to reality.
According to the Society Desk of the Saed News analytical news site, citing Bartarinha, scientists have recently discovered a new structure within the Earth's core, and now there’s news about the discovery of a massive ocean beneath the Earth's crust. Science fiction stories are getting closer to reality.
The idea of a vast ocean beneath the Earth's crust has been featured in many science fiction stories, but a group of researchers now believes this concept is not so far from reality. They have recently found that an area beneath the surface holds several times more water than all the Earth's oceans combined.
The Existence of a Massive Ocean Beneath the Earth's Crust Image
It all began with the discovery of a diamond, and now we may need to rethink previous beliefs about how water first appeared on Earth. A team of geologists from Goethe University in Germany was studying a newly discovered diamond found at a depth of 640 kilometers (about 400 miles) in Botswana, Africa.
To their surprise, they found a significant amount of water within this precious stone. This high water content is a strong indicator supporting the theory of a massive ocean under the Earth’s crust. Previously, this idea had been considered only a bizarre hypothesis. The layer where the diamond was discovered is called the "transition zone," separating the Earth's upper and lower mantle.
Materials located below this zone, closer to the Earth's core, are extremely dense and probably don't move much, unlike tectonic plates. According to Professor Frank Brenker from the Institute of Geosciences at Goethe University, the deformation of materials significantly limits the movement of rocks within the mantle.
Due to the density and static nature of this region, scientists had long been uncertain about how much water might be stored there. However, now experts are talking about the presence of a vast ocean under the Earth's crust. Using advanced spectroscopy, researchers detected ringwoodite (a mineral that contains large amounts of water) in the diamond. Brenker explained that their paper shows the transition zone is not like a dry sponge but actually holds a huge volume of water.
The discovery of a massive ocean beneath the Earth's crust brings us one step closer to the fantastical worlds we’ve read about in Jules Verne’s stories. Scientists had already proposed that materials like wadsleyite and ringwoodite in the deep Earth could hold up to six times the amount of water found in all Earth's oceans combined. Now, with the discovery of this diamond, that theory is gaining strong support.
This major discovery could lead to a revision of theories about the origin of Earth's water. Currently, scientists believe the Earth was initially too hot for water to form naturally and that water was delivered later via asteroid and meteorite impacts from other parts of the solar system.
However, if the existence of a massive underground ocean is confirmed, this external-origin theory for Earth’s water may no longer hold true.
