地質學家發(fā)現(xiàn)鐵“雪”落在地核

地質學家發(fā)現(xiàn)鐵“雪”落在地核

The Earth’s inner core is hot and pressurized, so the idea that it could contain snow seems far-fetched.

地球的內核是炎熱和高壓的，所以它可能包含雪的想法似乎是牽強的。

But that’s what a team of scientists has discovered.

但這是一組科學家的發(fā)現(xiàn)。

In this case, however, the snow is composed of tiny particles of iron, far heavier than snow falling on the planet’s surface, that are dropping from the molten core and piling on top of the inner core.

然而，在這種情況下，雪是由微小的鐵粒子組成的，遠比落在地球表面的雪重，這些鐵粒子從熔化的地核中掉落，堆積在地核上。

“The Earth’s metallic core works like a magma chamber that we know better of in the crust,” Jung-Fu Lin, a professor in the Jackson School of Geosciences at the University of Texas at Austin and a co-author of the study, said in a statement.

“地球的金屬核心就像一個巖漿房，我們在地殼中更了解它，”德克薩斯大學奧斯汀分校(University of Texas at Austin)杰克遜地球科學學院(Jackson School of Geosciences)教授、該研究的合著者林榮富(Jung-Fu Lin)在一份聲明中說。

“It’s sort of a bizarre thing to think about,” geochemist Nick Dygert explained. “You have crystals within the outer core snowing down onto the inner core over a distance of several hundred kilometers.”

地球化學家Nick Dygert解釋說:“這是一件奇怪的事情。”“外核內的晶體像雪一樣飄落到內核上，綿延數(shù)百公里。”

The research paper compares the snowing of iron particles with a different process that takes place inside magma chambers near the planet’s surface and involves minerals crystallizing out of the melt and coming together. In magma chambers, the compaction of the minerals creates what the researchers call “cumulate rock.” In the Earth’s core, the compaction of the iron helps the inner core grow and the outer core shrink.

該研究論文比較了鐵粒子的降雪與在地球表面附近的巖漿房中發(fā)生的不同過程，其中包括從熔體中結晶出來的礦物聚集在一起。在巖漿房中，礦物的壓實形成了研究人員所說的“堆積巖”。“在地核中，鐵的壓實作用有助于地核的生長和地核的收縮。

The findings could help geologists better understand how planets like ours form.

這些發(fā)現(xiàn)可以幫助地質學家更好地理解像我們這樣的行星是如何形成的。

“Relating the model predictions to the anomalous observations allows us to draw inferences about the possible compositions of the liquid core and maybe connect this information to the conditions that prevailed at the time the planet was formed,” he said. “The starting condition is an important factor in Earth becoming the planet we know.”

他說:“將模型預測與異常觀測聯(lián)系起來，可以讓我們推斷出可能的液體內核組成，并可能將這些信息與行星形成時的普遍條件聯(lián)系起來。”“初始條件是地球成為我們所知的行星的一個重要因素。”