Public Release: 13-Aug-2017
Goldschmidt Conference
New geochemical research indicates that existing theories of the formation of the Earth may be mistaken. The results of experiments to show how zinc (Zn) relates to sulphur (S) under the conditions present at the time of the formation of the Earth more than 4 billion years ago, indicate that there is a substantial quantity of Zn in the Earth’s core, whereas previously there had been thought to be none. This implies that the building blocks of the Earth must be different to what has been supposed. The work is presented at the Goldschmidt geochemistry conference in Paris.
The researchers, from the Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris (IPGP) melted mixtures of iron-rich metal and silicate compounds, containing Zn and S, at high temperatures and pressures up to 80 GPa and 4100K* to experimentally simulate core-mantle differentiation at the time of the Earth’s formation. They then measured how these elements were distributed (partitioned) between the core and mantle of their experiments. When they fed their results into computer models of the Earth’s formation, they found that none of the canonical models can sufficiently reproduce the S/Zn ratio of the present-day mantle. This means that the current estimates of the Earth’s composition, including its core, need to be modified, and therefore the way the core and mantle – i.e. the Earth – formed may also need to be revised.
“Most theories are based on the Earth being formed from only two types of stony meteorite, the CI chondrites or enstatite chondrites. However, this new work indicates that the Earth needs to have formed from a more S-poor source; in terms of the geochemistry, the best candidate for this material is the metal rich CH chondrites”, said Brandon Mahan (Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris).
“CH chondrites were first classified in 1985, and only a few dozen examples have been identified. They are rich in metallic iron and poor in easily vaporized elements, which indicates formation at very high temperatures, but they also contain a few percent of water-bearing minerals, which paradoxically indicates low temperatures.
This means that the CH chondrites — much like the Earth — have a very complex formation history which has given them features from both extremes of hot and cold. If our results are valid, this indicates that the building blocks of the Earth may be a bit more exotic than we thought” Existing theories of the Earth’s formation are largely based on geochemistry. One of the major geochemical clues to the Earth’s formation lies in the way elements such as Zn and S in meteorites are associated in a relatively well-known ratio, meaning that if you know the amount of Zn in a meteorite, you can estimate the amount of S. “We decided to test if that ratio was the same for the growing Earth as it is today using various possible source materials.”, said Brandon Mahan.
“We found that under conditions similar to those estimated when the Earth formed, Zn has a tendency to be distributed between the core and mantle differently than we had thought, i.e. there will be a significant amount of it bound up in the Earth’s core. Based on previous models, if we can place more Zn in the core, then by association you place more S in the core as well, much more in fact than most current observations suggest.
Most leading estimates cap the amount of sulphur in the Earth’s core at around 2%. If this is true, then using most known meteorites as a source material for Earth puts the S/Zn ratio of the mantle way above current accepted values, because too much S ends up in the mantle, indicating that perhaps the Earth cannot be made from any of the solar system materials that have previously been proposed as its source material.
But if the building blocks of the Earth were something like the CH Chondrites, this could give us an Earth pretty similar to the one we see today.”
*For comparison, 80GPa is around x1.5 the typical pressure needed to synthesise diamonds. The temperature of the surface of the Sun is around 5800K.
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It did “form”, we are on it currently standing on it and how much of my money was pissed away on this bullshite?
I thought this was settled science.
I see the problem.
They should’ve put Slartibartfast in charge of the Zn/S ratio.
That guy’s got a real eye for detail. He wouldn’t have screwed it up so badly.
Steve Garcia,
“Supposedly, all the heavier elements came from supernovas. However the escape velocity of supernova is 10,000 kps. All the planets and asteroids are traveling at about 40 kps – a 99.6% reduction in velocity (and therefore, energy). I have a hiuge problem with the Sun “catching” (decelerating and diverting) such materials and slowing them down by 99.6%. Where did all the energy go? With the escape velocity of the Sun (at 1 AU) being 42.1 kps, that 10,000 kps doesn’t compute. They have to shed too much energy.”
Apologies in advance if these are stupid questions: I’m not a scientist, and I don’t have any real knowledge about the subject.
Since stars form from the material in vast clouds is it possible that the existing clouds, in which the previous two generations of stars formed, would be large enough and dense enough that the momentum of matter from a supernova would mostly be distributed by collisions as it traversed the cloud? I wonder how dense a cloud would have to be if it were many light years across?
There is no actual hard evidence there is even anything existing called a supernova.
They are hypothesis, not even a theory.
The huge problem with supernova is the very things in space claimed to be supernova.
The profile of the event does not show an explosion
This is all they have to go on, events that happened and we have 0 evidence as to why they happened.
http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2016/g11/Historic_Supernova.jpg
Apologies, but I think this is one that, if you are interested enough, you need to go read up on yourself.
I am a retired engineer who has never stopped being interested in science, and I approach science from the POV of an engineer. Which means – toward scientists, “Please show me how all parts of your idea work”. When they can’t do that well enough, I see what can be done with their incomplete understandings/holes in their hypotheses.
In your reading, be skeptical. Compare what you read to everything else yo know so far. Skeptical doesn’t mena rejection. It means don’t accept it at face value – and look for ways of testing their ideas.
The scientists of 100 years ago were wrong in many of their understandings. (I know; I’ve read a bunch of it.
I understand WHY they thought as they did, but they were wrong – in quite a few ways.) We can see all their errors from our present position in history.
100 years from now, others will look at our present state of science, and they will see flaws in what we understand today. It can be amusing, but it can also be a lesson: We are on a continuum, and not very far along it. Thus it goes and will continue, on into the future. They simply will know more in the future. And things we are certain that we know NOW – some of that is going to turn out to be wrong.
OK, we accept that the escape velocity of a supernova is 10 000 kps, and since matter does escape then that velocity is reached by at least some of its matter. But this is the velocity reached by the outer shell of the supernova. As the supernova expands, some will be shed into space as rings – which we see. Eventually what is left will expand and expand, but this may not be accelerating so greatly, and in any case, as the mass decreases, so the escape velocity will be lower.
Eventually you will reach the case where chunks of the supernova core are being ejected at low speeds, and rather than being in a plasma state, or a gas state, will be liquid. While solid rocks hitting each other will break, liquid chunks will be more likely to coalesce.
The possibility is that rather than the outer parts of the supernova having become planets, or become dust/granules that could become planets, it is the core which disintegrated and collected bits and pieces over the next few million years that became the planets as we know them. That is, we are now standing – or sitting – on the remains of the core of a supernova. And the radioactivity which existed upteen billion years ago – perhaps 10B – has now reduced to virtually nothing.
Also a far out possibility, that the uniform (or nearly so) 4 degree temperature now observed in space is not due to the original big bang, but to the remains of the supernova that created us so many B years ago. The outer shell has cooled and we are getting the result of radiation back from the cold outer shell.
you can’t accept that really, because there to date is not one jot of any kind of real evidence supernova are even physically real
They have been observed, so, yes, they are real.
Supernova are a direct result of tragically bad theory.
The sun is not all gas, the latest imagery from the Swedish telescope shows what appears to be condensed matter, and if there is any condensed matter on the sun, it cannot collapse in on itself as per the standard model.
Theoretical astrophysics is in crisis, no denying that. It’s largely a joke field.
Plasma cosmology is the way of the future.
Everything is made from plasma, elements the lot.
To believe earth’s spin has been so consistent without an external driver is laughable. Our spin is too consistent to be merely momentum.
Every planet and the sun are in a circuit, the latest findings are showing this to be true.
Wow. Your opening paragraph is misunderstanding several things.
“…since matter does escape then that velocity is reached by at least some of its matter.”
Well, THEY assert that OUR heavy elements got made IN that supernova AND got here, so OUR heavy elements must have been some of those “that got away”, right?
“But this is the velocity reached by the outer shell of the supernova.”
There is no outer shell. It’s an explosion. There is a blast front, an expanding blast front. Nearly all material escapes. Since the explosion is “out in space” it is not confined. Which directions do the particles get ejected? Answer: 360°x 360°. SOME movies get this right, and when there is an explosion out in space they show a SPHERE. On Earth an H-bomb will make a mushroom cloud, but that has to do with both gravity and the reflection off the ground. In space, with no ground, the mushroom cloud doesn’t exist; it is a spherical blast front instead.
If you explode a bomb out in space, how much remains at the ground zero? Not much, right? This holds true, no matter if it is an M-80 or if it is a 4th of July fireworks display or a nova or a supernova. Think of that: How much of each fireworks explosion stays at the center. LOOK FOR IT NEXT TIME.
“As the supernova expands, some will be shed into space as rings – which we see.”
I think you are mistaking a shell – seen edge-on – for a ring. That is a SPHERE. What you see is the blast front, still expanding. just like with fireworks, only with more material and more equally spread out. It looks stationary, but it isn’t. It is like an expanding BUBBLE.
Look at photos of bubbles or videos. Most of what you see is reflection, usually. I found some images minus a lot of reflection. Take a look here: http://www.taftpubliclibrary.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/bubble_mania.jpg
See? That looks a lot like a ring, but it is a SPHERE, a shell. In astronomy when we see such things, try viewing them as bubbles, bubbles of the blast front. If it is a supernova, and if they are right, then those are moving outward at AT LEAST 10,000 kps.
“Eventually what is left will expand and expand, but this may not be accelerating so greatly, and in any case, as the mass decreases, so the escape velocity will be lower.”
Ask yourself what is left. How much is left in the center of each firework explosion? Almost nothing. It is just sitting there. And then gravity takes it and it falls.
“Eventually you will reach the case where chunks of the supernova core are being ejected at low speeds, and rather than being in a plasma state, or a gas state, will be liquid. While solid rocks hitting each other will break, liquid chunks will be more likely to coalesce.”
That is an interesting theory.
AT LAST. The current theory is complete and utter nonsense as is the guessed age of the earth.
The age is pretty well established by assays of nuclear decay products from independent sources. Zircon crystals with specks of uranium and the right isotope of lead which decayed from it are used to date old granite rocks of the Precambrian shield. The ratios of isotopes of lead, and decay of radioactive potassium into argon in feldspars. These and other nuclear assays are well established.
Get a good, simplified essay on the subject. You will be convinced. Try the geology departments of any university. They all have readable stuff on this and o her topics. This isn’t climate science!
“This isn’t climate science!” It appears somebody wants it to be, though!
The age of the earth isn’t guessed. It’s measured.
PROXIES are measured. They MEASURE/count radioactive decay remnants in rocks, then compare that to calculated values of half-lives.
As an example, Willard Libby, around 1950, for radioisotope Carbon14 used a value of 5668 years as the half-life of Carbon 14. This was later, in the 1960s, corrected to 5730 years. It was assumed early on to be a straight line calibratino curve, but from experience they found out that the factors influencing C14 decay were not constant. The nuke testing in the 1950s and 1960s was part of how they discovered the variations. Now they use calibration curves, which are updated every few years to include new data from around the world. The last three times the calibration curves were changed in 2004, 2009, and 2013. They also use a different curve for underwater carbon dating.
They work very hard to get the calibration curves correct. When they change it, sometimes it changes calibrated dates by as much as 100 years, for the same exact radiocarbon result from a lab.
That is radiocarbon, and it doesn’t apply to anything older than about 57,000 years – about ten half-lives. Even at that age, readings are suspect.
So they use other radioisotopes for the ages of rocks. I am not up to snuff on those, though I run into it a lot. I have other things on my plate right now. If I needed to know it, I would.
Getting ahead of ourselves.
Has anyone actually established the formation of the Earth?
Eggheady and flawed. The earth’s shells were formed 4Bya and they have evolved from transfer of material into and out of the mantle and crust and new material from space, Volcanic material intrudes from below the crust, subducted crust goes into the mantle, meteors and almost constant meteorite dust silently raining down on us and pummeled by asteroids.
Volcanic ‘exhalative’ massive sulphide deposits, dominantly copper and zinc sulphides, by the way, from the mantle and deposited on ancient sea floors provide much of our zinc metal and a heck of a lot of Sulphur today. Sulphide ‘smokers’ continue to share ft zinc and other metals and Sulphur out of the mantle. The guys are 4B yrs out of date. Inexcusable.
This subject is certainly related to the global warming debate. I will quote from an article in National Geographic.
Three Theories of Planet Formation Busted
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/02/110222-planets-formation-theory-busted-earth-science-space/
Actually, Wikipedia lists 15 theories over the years, that have been proposed. I think the National Geographic article is about the ones that are still popular. The article describes how data from our fairly recent ability to detect extra-solar planets has impacted the theories.
“Still, some experts aren’t quite ready to give up on current theories…
Hal Levison, a planet-formation theorist from the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado.
‘The only thing we can say for sure is that those models don’t work,’ Levison said. ‘Those are crappy models.’
It seems that reliance on crappy models, and asserting that they show absolute fact, is the norm for modern science.
-joe
Your comments’ statements are worth filing away, at the least.
When 15 theories – or even as few as 4 – exist, then there IS no theory. It is still in the “chaos period”, like Thomas Kuhn described the early 15 or so decades of investigations into electricity. The evidence about electricity was quite varied and only after collecting a lot more evidence did a coherent idea come about. After that the current paradigm about electricity took hold. The planetary formation theories are not to that paradigm stage yet, and they need to stop pretending that it is.
Gloateus is here as the Defender of the Faith, but which of the four (or more) is he defending? He spells things out clearly, and I applaud that effort. I haven’t had time to read all his comments, but from what I’ve read so far, he hasn’t swayed me one iota. I consider the one that is presented the most as a crappy model. When any theory glosses over the FUNCTIONAL and detailed connections between one state and the next, and when those connecting steps don’t hold water, I consider it a crappy model.
In designing in industry (my career), every step of every machine or piece of equipment must work. ANY aspect that doesn’t work means you did a crappy design job. Any sub-assembly that doesn’t work has to be MADE to work – whatever it takes. In the end, when they don’t work, people get REALLY f***ing pissed. And you lose a LOT of street cred. I fortunately never had any major screw-ups. I was around a few, though. It wasn’t pretty.
Science should not be any different. These theories need to be revised until they work. There are literally MILLIONS of scientists in the world today. You’d think they could get this right.
Maybe the problem is that scientists don’t have their feet held to the fire. Maybe they get the same pay if their hypotheses work out or not. There will be more government money next year. Just keep publishing and you get some of it. Even if your papers don’t hold water.
Y’all are forgetting about the dark matter and its forces.
Well it seems to be working fine now so I’m happy.
James Bull
I liked the theory that the Earth itself was a collapsed Star.