A reservoir of water three times the volume of all the oceans has been discovered deep beneath the Earth’s surface. The finding could help explain where Earth’s seas came from.
The water is hidden inside a blue rock called ringwoodite that lies 700 kilometres underground in the mantle, the layer of hot rock between Earth’s surface and its core.
The huge size of the reservoir throws new light on the origin of Earth’s water. Some geologists think water arrived in comets as they struck the planet, but the new discovery supports an alternative idea that the oceans gradually oozed out of the interior of the early Earth.
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“It’s good evidence the Earth’s water came from within,” says Steven Jacobsen of Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. The hidden water could also act as a buffer for the oceans on the surface, explaining why they have stayed the same size for millions of years. Pinging the planet
Jacobsen’s team used 2000 seismometers to study the seismic waves generated by more than 500 earthquakes. These waves move throughout Earth’s interior, including the core, and can be detected at the surface. “They make the Earth ring like a bell for days afterwards,” says Jacobsen.
By measuring the speed of the waves at different depths, the team could figure out which types of rocks the waves were passing through. The water layer revealed itself because the waves slowed down, as it takes them longer to get through soggy rock than dry rock.
the fountains of the deep were broken up? Genesis. the waters of the deep are frozen. gee, the book was right again?
Earth is pretty round. Everest 29,000 feet up. Marianas trench 36,000 feet down. Both a fraction of a percent of the 21 million feet radius of earth from core to surface*. We have just enough ocean water that it settles between the two.
Might have come from comets or might have spewed out the middle of the earth but seems more likely to me that it was a solid bit of earth when gravity was shaping the planet and since then its melted.
*source: googled it
Earth is pretty round. Everest 29,000 feet up. Marianas trench 36,000 feet down. Both a fraction of a percent of the 21 million feet radius of earth from core to surface*. We have just enough ocean water that it settles between the two.Might have com