A new study, published in the Journal Nature, says the Earth’s inner core may be filled with a weird substance that is neither solid nor liquid.
- It suggests that the Earth’s hot and highly pressurized inner core could exist in a “superionic state” — a whirling mix of hydrogen, oxygen and carbon molecules, continuously sloshing through a grid-like lattice of iron.
- The study gives a new dimension to half a century belief that Earth’s deepest recesses consist of a molten outer core surrounding a densely compressed ball of solid iron alloy.
- Earth’s core is subject to bone-crushing pressures and scorching temperatures as hot as the surface of the sun, and its contents have long been a subject of speculation among scientists and science fiction authors alike.
- Since the 1950s, advances in the study of earthquake-generated seismic waves — which travel through the core — have enabled researchers to make more refined guesses as to what’s inside the heart of the planet, but even today the picture is far from clear.
